The Hook Belle Pirate Alternate Universe Story
by LotornoMiko
Summary: In desperate need of a title! Darkish AU. King Maurice sent Killian and his brother on a mission that resulted in Liam's death. What better way to get his revenge, than to strike out against the King's daughter, the beautiful princess Belle? But things don't always go as plan... Summary sucks I know...Non Con Warnings...CHAPTER SEVEN HAS BEEN UPDATED WITH OVER 1000 WORDS ADDED!
1. Chapter 1

Standard Disclaimer Time! I do not own Once Upon A time, or it's characters. Nor do I make any money off of this story. This is done purely for fun, for entertainment purposes, for a creative outlet. 

-Michelle

From a young age, I have known my fair share of heart break, my life left in shambles. From the mother who was taken from me far too soon, to the father who could not truly love me, and everything in between, it's not been a charmed life that I have led. For all the riches, for all the indulgence, the endless toys and then books, I've always existed as separate from other people. With nary a true friend to my name, just servants and those angling to elevate their own status, even my own father has sought to use me.

There was never any doubt in my mind that he would one day try. That my life at the convent would not continue, that I would not be allowed to exist as I had, free of the lace and frills of my title, the thick heavy gowns, and the responsibility of my crown. The one uncertain factor in all this? Just WHEN would the summons come, and just how desperate would he let things get? But the answer to the latter is by not very much, my father a cold, hard, practical man who upon the first stirrings of true war, immediately sought to make an alliance. Only then did he truly think of me, only then did he want to be bothered with the daughter he had cast away. By my virgin blood, and by my hand in marriage, my father, the King, would seal the alliance.

I had always known it would come down to this. I had always known I would have no say in who I would marry. Never was the hope of marrying for love and respect. And never for the idea of family and friendship. I was a political tool, a means to an end, a pretty bauble meant to dangle before the most powerful of Lords. And there were few as powerful as the house my father meant to tie me to. The House of Hunters, the slayers of ogres, the ender of wars. A far too distant neighbor of ours, the House of Hunters shouldn't have even been interested in the troubles of the kingdom of Avonlea. We weren't the richest of kingdoms, neither in land, money, or people. And yet, my father did have one thing to appeal to them. To appeal more specifically to their unmarried King. Gaston of the House Of Hunters, had always been a great lover of beauty. At least in the physical, feminine form. I am no conceited twit, but I have been told I am beautiful, and that I only grow more so every year.

Rumors of my supposed beauty were all that it took. Not talk of my intelligence, my courage, my heart that was so ready to love and be loved. Gaston cared for none of it. For him, only the best would do, the most beautiful of females rumored to exist in all of the Enchanted Kingdoms. Only THAT woman would do as his wife. I was sent for almost immediately, the summons arriving, and within the hour I and my entourage were hustled onto a ship. There hadn't been any time to pack. There hadn't been any time for any real goodbyes. I had been collected, along with my chaperon, and several of the women who had worked closely with me as servant and aide over the thirteen years I had lived at the convent.

The convent is as close to home as I could claim, the castle I had lived in with my father a distant, blurred memory at best. I had barely been eight years of age, the last time I had set foot there, and my mother hadn't been dead for more than a week. I hadn't been allowed to cry, hadn't been given any true comfort or attempts at solace. I had worn a pretty dress of black silk, and was paraded out with the coffin, the brave little princess who had lost her mother too soon. The kingdom had wept for me, and then just like that, I was all but forgotten.

I have just one special memory of that time before I was shipped off to the convent. The one sympathetic face, the sad but knowing eyes, and the crooked shape of his lips. He had been handsome even then, with his boyish good looks already hinting at the devastating beauty he would one day grow into. To me alone did he speak. To me did he offer condolences, a plain cotton handkerchief being pressed into my small hands. Telling me that it was okay to cry, to let it all out, with a wisdom that belied his young age.

I can remember shaking with the suppressed emotion, not knowing how to let it out, how to even try. He had moved as though to touch me, and just like that, the flood gates had opened. The tears had fallen, and I had muffled my cries with the handkerchief that the boy had given me. He had stood there looking a little lost at my tears, wanting to comfort me more, but knowing two things. I was inconsolable not just because my mother had died, but because of my station. As a princess, I wasn't to be touched by those with common blood. Even my closest servants, had been of the nobility, daughters past the marriageable age, or those disgraced by scandal of their own.

This boy, beautiful and brave, had risked so much just by approaching me. A fact that was not appreciated by his older brother. That youth who was already so close to being a man, had not been anywhere half as handsome as the boy who had first approached me. Nor had he been anywhere as kind, his face angry, his blues eyes so similar to that of his younger brother, but sparking wild with his shock and his fury. I remember him roughly grabbing hold of his brother, snarling his name, and forcing the boy to bow down before me. I had tried to soothe him, tried to explain to him that the boy, that Killian, had done nothing wrong. But I don't think that I was believed.

I don't know what happened to that boy. Don't know what punishment his brother might have inflicted on him. Two days later, it was beyond my ability to care, the shock of being sent away numbing me to everything but the fact that I was losing the only home I had ever known. And now for the second time, do I stand on a ship, watching as a place I had also known as home grow smaller and smaller, the further out to sea that we went.

Even after I can no longer see it, can no longer spy even a glimpse of the convent's grouping of islands, I stay situated at the rail. The chill wind blows through and rustles my clothing, tugs at the curling strands that have escaped my otherwise tightly bound hair. The cloak about my shoulders is the softest of fur lined velvet, and the many layers of heavy dress that I wear, help to keep me warm. But I can barely breathe for the tight corset, the confines of a princess' gown so different from the simple shifts and dresses that I had worn when at the convent.

Already caught in the trappings of my title, the ship that I ride on, has come prepared for a princess. Made heavy with my dowry, with the many chests of gold, along with dresses and jewels and an assortment of toiletries, I go not to my father, but travel instead to meet my soon to be husband. I grip the rail of the ship, grateful that the kidskin gloves that I wear, hide how white my knuckles have gone. I will not cry, will not let them see my proud and haughty facade crumble. But I mourn the life that I am losing, the freedom that was never truly mine to command.

My chaperon, an older woman appointed by my father, stands off to the side of me. She wears a disapproving frown, fusses with her own cloak, and makes muttered comments about how we should get below deck before the storm hits. I tune her out as best I can, staring, staring as though my will alone will get the ship to turn around. It doesn't, and it wouldn't, not even at a request from me. Princess I may be, but I am not in charge here, not in command of even my own destiny. I can only hope that my husband, will be a kinder man than my father ever was, that Gaston won't make too many demands of my time, and allow me the chance to just be.

With that hope in my heart, I stand for just short of forever at that railing. Around my chaperon and I, the sailors run rampant, rushing to and fro to ready the ship for the approaching storm. I hear the hard sound of canvas flapping, the men trying to tie it up, so that the storm's winds won't rip the sail to shreds. And then I hear a cry of the man up in the crow's nest, the sailor shouting out word that another ship has appeared over the horizon. I turn in the new ship's direction, and can barely make out anything, not even with the aid of a looking glass. I catch snippets of conversation, the sailors describing a ship that match that of one of my father's fleet. They assumed it is just one more escort, a ship to join the half a dozen that are sailing with us towards Gaston's kingdom. There is a relaxed air about them, the men confidant and unconcerned, until another ship is spotted. And then another, and another, and then the sky is cracking apart, rain falling and thunder booming as a cannon ball careens into the side of one of the escorts.

My chaperon turns pale faced and screams. Others scream as well. I hear one word repeated over and over, pirates, and it moves the crew into new action. The sailors run to arm their cannons, and the soldiers that had been resting below deck rush up top ready to lend a hand, ready to fight and die to protect the ship's cargo. My chaperon nearly faints, clutching at my arm for support. I stand frozen, my mouth agape, and then a cannon ball takes out the mast of the ship that I am on. Suddenly I can't move fast enough, dragging the older woman with me, as I look for what exactly I do not know. There's no truly safe spot aboard a ship that is being attacked, that is constantly bombarded with cannon fire, and there is no real escape either.

"Get below deck!" Screams a commanding officer. I balk at the idea, thinking it a sure death sentence should the ship start to go under. My chaperon reacts to the soldier, to the order that he bellows. She's already dragging my unwilling form forward, and down the creaking steps. I can still hear the explosions, still hear the storm and the screams. But most of all I hear the crying, the women below deck fearing not just for their lives, but for their virtue. I should fear for my own as well, but I am in state of shock. I remain that way as I am hustled into the royal cabin, as other women are brought in to tend to my needs. I have none in the moment, and just stand there as the women weep and huddle together for support. They envelope me within their fold, and together we hold hands, and many pray. And then we feel the ship rocked hard in place, the worst of the cannon fire yet, which galvanizes one of the servants to start screaming.

Her screams get through my shock, and then I am slapping her, trying to make her calm down and be quiet. It doesn't quite work, her muffled whimpers an accompaniment to the new sounds that we hear. That of the ship being boarded, the battling taking on a more personal desperation as pirate and solider fight, and sword meets cutlass. The sounds of the fighting, of men dying, and the occasional boom of cannon fire? it lasts for what feels like hours.

It's no better when the worst of the fighting just stops. We hear the death rattling above us, hear the victors laughing and securing the ship. Most of all we hear the torture, the interrogation that goes on.

"Where is your princess?! Where does she hide?!"

Wide fearful eyes look to me for guidance. I can't be frightened now, I can't afford to be. I lift my head proudly, tear the jeweled tiara off my brow, and throw it to the floor.

"They can't know that I am the princess." I say. The women just keep looking at me, and I snap out louder. "They cannot know! Do you understand?!" They react to the authoritative sound of my voice, nodding dumbly.

"Quickly!" I hiss, shrugging out of my cloak. I then start pulling off the jewels that they had covered me in, the necklace and the many rings of a princess. I even go so far as to wash off the make up, but there's not time to change out of the dress. Even if there was, there's nothing like what I had worn at the convent to fit me here now.

I make do with what I have, trying to help some of the women of a similar size and build fit into some of my wardrobe. Soon enough there is at least three of us dressed somewhat similarly, that it won't be immediately apparent just who is the princess.

We stand together, and await our fate, and then the door to the royal cabin is kicked open. No one screams, though there is a collective gasp, the women huddling closer together at the sight of the group of pirates. They look and leer at us, but more than that, the jewels on the floor catch their attention. Suddenly the room is full of pirates, a dozen or more, and they are looting the place, taking everything of value from it. I hear excited shouts from elsewhere in the ship, and realize the pirates have found the chests of gold that make up my dowry. I don't try to delude myself into thinking that is all they have come for. And I'm right. The women and I are herded upstairs, out onto the deck. It is a scene straight out of a nightmare, for though the blood has been washed away by the rain, the bodies remain. I close my eyes against the sight, then whip my head around at a shout.

One of the officers is still alive, battling with a dark haired pirate. The pirate is clad all in black leather, and is a dark shadow against the storm. The soldier is clad in the blue and gold military uniform of my kingdom, and he fights with all that he has left. It's not enough, even my inexperienced eye can see that the pirate is toying with him, his laughter carrying to me over the roar of the wind. A woman cries out, and as one we all turn our heads away too late to block out the sight of the sword stabbing straight through, the officer being viciously impaled. A cheer rises up from the pirates, and I want to clap my hands over my ears to block out that mocking sound.

I don't do it, anymore than I close my eyes to what is happening around me. Past the women I stay huddled with, I can see at least two of our six ships already floundering, taking on water. It'll be a few hours yet before the ships actually goes down completely, but it's already started.

Surrounding us, with still smoking cannons are four ships. Three of them look very much how a pirate's ship was expected to be, right down to black canvas flag with the skull and daggers painted on it. But the sight of the fourth ship shocks me, for it not only mimics one of my father's fleet, it IS one. I recognize the name, react with shock to see the lost Jewel of the Realm before me and under these circumstances. Lightning flashes brighter, and I see that the stolen ship bears the pirates' flag as well. I have so many questions, wondering what has happened to it's crew, and then the pirates are grabbing at us, pulling us out of the huddle that we had clung to for comfort.

"Which one of you is the princess?!"

I can feel harsh fingers digging into my arms, shaking me for an answer I won't give them. None of the women will, we stand united, ready to die if need be, if it means thwarting the pirates in this much at least. I stand just as brave as any of them, silent in the face of this threat, and then lightning illuminates the sky. I gasp, my eyes widening, staring at the pirate who is slowly approaching. He is casual as he wipes off the blood and gore from his sword, but that proof of his brutality is not what I am reacting to. It's him, his appearance, the boy now a man but no less handsome here than he was then.

My mouth opens without my thinking, the words, a name issuing out of me in a strangled sound.

"Killian?"

Instantly he is before me, his hands reaching for me. One touches my shoulder, the other grips rough hold of my chin. I shake in shock, never having known the touch of a man beyond that of my father. My skin prickles with cold and awareness, the blue eyes familiar but not. Gone is the sympathy, the gentle caring. In it's place is a blazing coldness, a narrowed stare as he studies me intently. With his hand as the guiding force, he turns me so that he can admire my profile from another angle. This way and that way, does he look at me, and then at last he nods.

"It's her."

"How can you be sure?" asked a red cap wearing pirate.

"Don't doubt me, Smee." The pirate, Killian, hasn't let go of me. He's almost smiling, but there's a world of cruelty in that look. It's so foreign and unrecognizable to the boy I had remembered, my lips parting to ask, to demand, what had happened to him to make him become this...this menace.

"This is her. This is the princess of Avonlea..." He speaks it so certainly, and with a dark purring undertone of satisfaction to those words. "Belle..."

I react to hearing my name on his lips, shaking my head no. "What? I'm not..."

"Don't LIE to me!" His voice cracks like a whip. The women cry out, fearing for me. I don't blame them. He looks so furious now, like a demon ready to strike, and I wonder if he will slap me. He doesn't, instead dragging me with him, towards the railing.

"Vengeance is ours!" That makes the pirates cheer. I've no idea what this means, what vengeance I could possibly play a hand in. And then I hear the pirate say words that made my already cold blood freeze.

"Sink the ships." Killian orders. "Let there be NO survivors..."

"What?! No! You can't!" I start to say, and find myself suddenly lifted up. I fight him, I scream, and then find myself thrown over his shoulder. I scream harder, start beating at his back, and he slaps a hand on my bottom. It shocks more than hurts, the heavy layers of my skirts, protecting me from the worst of the slap.

"You can't do this!" I still scream as he carries me off. "You can't..." I shake my head, trying to plead with him. "Haven't you killed enough?! At least let the women go!"

"I'll not have word of this reach your father until I want it to." He retorts.

"Please!" I beg this time. "The women...they have done nothing, they don't deserve..."

"They deserve less what will happen to them onboard a ship with pirates." Killian retorts. I shake in response, knowing he is right, but unable to reconcile the idea that the women would be better off dead than raped.

"Please..." I all but whisper it. "At least...least let the women decide..."

I don't believe for a second I've reach him, that I've appealed to whatever shred of decency a pirate is capable of having. But then he stops, turns to the man that he had named Smee. They hold a muttered, hurried conversation, and all the while I whisper please. I almost wilt with relief when the pirate Smee hurries off to relay the captain's words, the women being offered a choice. Come with the pirates, or stay here and die. Most choose the fate worst than death, weeping and hysterical, but ready to live rather than drown.

I'm about the only one not crying, not hysterical, too limp with relief and the fear of what had almost happened to the women. What could still happen. I block out the thought that that same thing might happen to ME, instead whispering my questions.

"Why are you doing this?" I ask. "What does your vengeance have to do with my father?"

He doesn't answer me, not right away. He takes the time to get us onboard the Jewel of the Realm, and actually leaves me to dangle from his shoulder as he gives out orders. The women are then brought onboard, but it will take time for all of the loot to be secured. When at last he does slide me off of his shoulder, it is done slowly, menacingly, letting me feel every hard inch of his body. Shorter and softer than him, I have to stare up to meet the hard, unforgiving gaze of his blue eyes.

"Everything." He snarls. "My vengeance is owed everything to your father."

That only leaves me with more questions, a dozen or more racing through my mind. My lips tremble, my mouth opens to speak. "This is not the way...vengeance is never the way."

"I'll be the judge of that." Is his retort.

"You'll spark a war that will devastate our homeland!" I stare at him, my gaze searching his. "Is whatever my father did, do the people of Avonlea deserve what your vengeance will bring them?!"

That gives him pause. And then his eyes narrow with a hateful gleam. "It's no less than what Maurice would do to so many others!"

"What are you talking about?!" I cry out. "He is trying to STOP the war from happening. He wants peace..."

"Peace?" He snorts. "Peace is the furthest thing on that King's mind."

"That's not true!" I protest. "The alliance..."

"The alliance isn't about peace, but about securing and maintaining his power. He'll do anything for it, to keep it, and to expand it...even whore out his only daughter."

The slap I give him turns his head to the side. "Bastard!" I seethe. "How dare you."

"It hurts, doesn't it?" Killian asks. "The truth..." The flash of lightning illuminates his smile for one second. "Well there is a lot more truth and hurt to be had!" He shoved at me, and I stumbled, crashing into the waiting arm of the pirate named Smee.

"Captain?" He inquries, and Killian motions with a jerk of his head toward the railing.

"Let her see just a taste of what her father has wrought..."

"Aye aye captain!" Smee exclaims, and starts dragging me to the railing. Held there, I am forced to watch the ships that we leave behind. They grow smaller and smaller, but the many flames destroying them light up their positions on the water. It's not until we are quite some distance away, that the pirates open fire, mercilessly pummeling the already floundering ships.

"So cruel..." I whisper. It's all I can manage, standing and staring, then sagging weakly in Smee's grip. It's all too much for me, the storm and the pirates, and especially HIM. What has happened to Killian, what has made the man so different from the boy that I remembered? I don't know, but I am determined to find out.

To Be Continued...

Hate my ending paragraph. =/

So...this is an AU idea I have been trying to start for over a year. I could never get it started to my satisfaction. Originally, my ideal was to have to all be a Belle POV up to the middle of the story, than switch to Killian telling the rest. But it's not gonna work out that way. I'll be switching between them as the story deem fit.

Originally, the drafts I had were VERY different. I wanted it to be set in the future, where Killian wakes up Belle and they have a intimate encounter. Then one of them starts reflecting on how this all had happened. but I could never get that version right. Damn it!

For the most part I am happy with what I ended up with! Yay! Still need a title though. Glad to finally have the first chapter written. By the way, not sure if it's apparent, but Killian here has BOTH his hands. XD

Laters! Oh wait...taking title suggestions as I have none at the moment!

-Michelle


	2. Chapter 2

The storm shows no sign of letting up. With it's howling winds that are whipping faster and colder, with it's rain that pelts down hard enough to hurt, we're all soaked within seconds. My teeth chatter, and I huddle for the warmth of the group, but there is none to be found. We're all wet, freezing, and absolutely stone faced, our misery equating to a quiet kind of acceptance that doesn't last long. A sudden scream is heard from among us, a panicked hysterical sound that heralds the breaking of the huddle. Something-someone jostles my arm as she careens past my shocked form. I turn and see reddish brown hair gone even darker from the torrential downpour, the woman that it belongs to past the point of caring just who or what she attracts, as she makes a run for the railing that separates life and death so neatly.

We all realize her intent too late, screaming in panic, in horror. My hands fly up to my mouth, trying to muffle the worst of my sobbing. She has reached the rail, is attempting to climb up and over it, but that heavy dress of hers is slowing her down. She still tries her best, and we just stand there, too shocked to do more than voice our panic and dismay.

Impossible, but before anyone can reach her, the woman gets a knee up on the rail. She has the most unsettling of expressions on her face, a kind of manic acceptance of what she is about to do. The pirate, Smee, is already rushing to stop her, but such is the strength of her madness, that the woman makes a valiant attempt at fighting him off. With one hand gripping the railing, she uses the other to beat at the pirate's head. They seemed locked in their struggle, and then we are all screaming, watching rooted to the spot as the woman falls off the rail a midst her struggle. The pirate Smee cries out a no, makes a valiant attempt to catch at the ends of her skirt, and then HE is there.

Killian. He swoops down like a hawk sighting prey, effortlessly catching at the woman's waist, and leaving her to dangle in place for just a few seconds more, before hauling her up over the rail, and back down onto the deck. She doesn't appreciate the rescue one bit, screaming, cursing, twisting in his arms to try and claw at his face. His hands gathers her wrists together in his strong grip, the woman shrieking at the top of her lungs and that's before he squeezes down on them.

With a mad look upon her face, the woman goes wild, her back bowing as she strains this way and that in an attempt to get free. There's movement from her skirts, but the fabric is so soaked that it weighs down her attempts to kick out her legs. She's been effectively rendered helpless by both the pirate and the storm, and it's not until she realizes this and accepts it, that the fight just dies out of her.

I and the other women just stand there, watching as with a tortured wail, the woman slumps against the pirate's chest. Flashes of lightning illuminate the scene, the woman with her long hair all in disarray, wet clumps of it obscuring over one of her eyes. More frightening is Killian, the absolutely furious expression that he wears. The livid light in his eyes, it feels as if it's all for ME, that malevolent blue locking onto me from across the deck. Ensnared, I can only look back, my mouth trembling with uncertainty. I want to both damn him and to thank him, an odd mix of gratitude and anger alive in my own heart. Alive and mixed together, acknowledging him as both savior and catalyst for the life and death struggle we had just borne witness to.

I don't say anything, I can't, instead just standing there frozen in place as Killian snarls out an order. "Get them off the deck!"

There's an order to the chaos his voice brings, several of the pirates breaking off from their duties, to rush and play heed to their captain. There's no confusion as to WHO will come, no one to argue just who can be spared. There's nothing but action, the four men surrounding us. The women around me group closer together, trembling from fear, from the cold, from the sight of that curved metal that now lays exposed.

"All right, you heard the captain." The voice that speaks has to shout to be heard over the winds. It's a big swarthy fellow that speaks, a man with skin colored so dark an ebony, that he is blacker than the night the storm has thrust us into. He's nothing more than a shadow, not even those flashes of lightning can touch him, the man a dark blur that prods us forward with the threat of his cutlass at our backs.

The threat of it can't move us any faster, the group of us walking in an awkward slow huddle. The footing here is slippery, the wood floor awash with water from the storm, and from the waves that rock violently against the ship. Occasionally one rises high enough to crash over the railing, to flood the deck with even more water. It's such a powerful display, such a fearsome force of nature, the storm and the sea working together in an attempt to drown us. It's almost a relief when we are led below deck, when there is not ankle deep water lapping at our cold feet.

There's light here, a warm but flickering glow from several lit lanterns. They rattle in place on the wall, their enchanted flames flickering as though in danger of going out. The flickering casts odd shadows on the walls, and then someone screams, spying movement out of the dark.

"Demon!" She says, her nails digging into the sleeve covering my arm. I glance where she points, but there is nothing, no sign of movement, no sign of anything but the shadows.

"Just a trick of the light?" I murmur it, trying to sound convincing. The woman shakes her head, her wet curls bouncing from the force of that movement.

"I know what I saw!" She insists. I glance towards the shadowy figure that is the ebony colored man, but he has no patience for questions. Nor for any sort of delay.

"Move it!"

He snaps it in a booming tone, an authoritative sound that frightens us into obeying. It moves our feet, makes us all but run down the hallway, with the pirate's following at a more leisurely pace. Their laughter chases after us, their malicious amusement mocking us, as we hurry forward and then downward, deeper into the bowels of the ship. There's even less light this deep down in the ship, the place dry but cold

The shadows are thicker here, and that gets us to slow. I can make out dark objects, but I cannot guess as to what they are. I hear a hiss of a match, see the light flicker to life in the lantern. It casts it's glow on our surroundings, and I realize we are in some sort of storage room, with all manner of things crowded about. Everything from barrels of fresh water, to crates of dried food, and gold in between, it's a literal treasure trove of stolen booty and supplies. These pirates have been busy, far busier than I would have thought possible.

It makes me wonder, pondering how they had operated for so long without being caught, without widespread word of their antics reaching the ears of someone who would care enough to put a stop to them. But more than that, I wonder just how much more loot they can take on, before they will be forced to unload it. Not much by the look of it, and I realize that sooner rather than later, the pirates will be forced to make land. No real idea forms, but the excited hope alights in my heart at the thought of what land could possibly mean. Escape and salvation from these pirates, and not a moment too soon.

Excited by the idea of escape, I'm almost impatient now for the pirates to leave. I want to tell the others of the chance that we may have. I want to bolster their courage as well as their hope, chase away any doubts and regrets these women may have over the choice that they have made. Most of all I want to ensure that no one else decides it's better to take her own life, rather than to be made a pirate's whore.

I don't get the chance. I'm grabbed by the back of my dress, fingers digging harshly into the high collar that reaches almost to my neck. I let out a sound, a shocked, strangled nose, as I'm nearly choked by my own clothing. I'm hauled back towards a body, then dragged towards the ebony colored fellow who seems to be the appointed man in charge.

"Not you." He says, his pearl white teeth flashing with his open smirk. "The captain will want to deal with your personally."

I'm sure the color leeches out of my skin, so uneasy am I by those words. The women, my companions in misery, cry out in protest, one actually trying to reach towards me as though to physically tear my away from the pirate that is holding me. I can't make out all of her expression, but I hear the snarl in her voice as she makes demands for my release.

"Worry about your own self, wench." She is told. "You'll soon have worse problems to deal with than what the captain chooses to do with the princess."

She takes a step forward, and then another woman is grabbing hold of her. "Ruby no!" It's a name I'll remember, her display of bravado and concern warming my other wise fear ridden heart.

"It's okay Ruby." I tell her this with a bravery I do not feel. "Whatever my fate is, even if I were to die at his hands, I accept it."

"Die." It's a snort in my ear, a foul breath chuckling out of him. "Mad as the captain may be, I very much doubt killing you is on his mind." The laugh takes on a sinister tone, the pirate breathing even heavier in my ear. I close my eyes, but can't shut out the sound, and then he is gone, pulled roughly away by the ebony colored pirate.

"Watch your tongue." He says. "You know the captain's rules..."

"Yeah, yeah." The pirate sounded disgusted then. "I know them. Doesn't mean I have to LIKE it."

"You'll like it better than letting the ship run aground." laughed a third. "There'll be time enough for your fun, but later." At that, I heard the sound of something being spat out onto the floor. It seemed to speak plenty as to what the disgusted pirate thought of that.

My mind wondering just what these rules could possibly be, I can't help but voice it out loud. "These rules? What are they?"

"We're not to have ANY fun until we're well out of danger." I hadn't actually expected to get an answer, but the dark skinned man's words embolden my tongue.

"Well then." I say in my most haughty manner. "Then it will NEVER be time for your fun. And do you know why? Because you will ALWAYS be in danger. My father won't rest until he's seen you all hanged!"

My chin lifts more stubbornly in reply to the laughter the men let out. I don't understand how they could be so confidant, how they can not fear a King's wrath. They don't try to educate me on that either, dragging me out of the hold. I'm forced back the way we had come, going higher into the ship, until we reach where the royal cabin should have been. Only it's not the royal cabin any longer, but a pirate captain's room.

I'm shoved inside without any other true words being spoken to me. The only sound that follows is that of a lock being engaged, and the footsteps of the pirates as they move away. I'm left all alone inside Killian's private lair, and there's no light to be found.

My skin prickling with the cold and my unease, I fumble about in the dark. The ship continues to rock, but it doesn't feel quite as violent as it had once been. I wonder if the storm is letting up, or if I've only just gotten used to the motion. I pray for the latter, fearing what the end of the storm will bring down upon the women, upon ME. I don't want to believe Killian capable of it, of any of this, unable to reconcile the sympathetic boy that he had once been, to the man, the pirate he now so clearly was.

I shuffled over to what feels like a chair. I sit only because there is little left for me to do in this dark place. My hands clasp together, but my silent prayer is not for myself, not just for the women, but for the kingdom of Avonlea whose people will suffer if the alliance with the House of Hunters fall through.

I'm still praying when the door is unlocked. I lurch up out of my sitting position, hear the door slam shut, and then HIS voice speaking. "Why is it so bloody dark in here?!"

I hear the match's hiss, see the blue flame flare to life, trapped within the glass confines of the lantern. Most of all I see him, lit with that blue glow, his handsome face stern and scowling.

"Why are you just standing there, dripping puddles all over my furniture and floor?"

I slowly blink, the question the last thing that I had expected to hear from him, from anyone. He seems to let out an overly dramatic sigh, his displeasure noted in that sound.

"Take that wet dress off immediately."

"No." I say it firmly, in a tone meant to brook no arguments.

"I wasn't asking." Killian retorts.

"Yes, I'm sure you're a man very used to having your orders obeyed. But the fact remains, you have no authority over me."

He throws back his head with his laughter. "Do you honestly believe that, love? Darling, your royal blood doesn't mean a damn thing to me or to anyone else on this ship."

"That's not true." I protest, thinking of the women in the hold. He shrugs in response, and begins peeling himself out of his soaked leather coat. "What are you doing?!" I cry out in alarm.

"What does it look like I am doing?" He hasn't paused, the coat being thrown onto the chair I had just been sitting in. Underneath that coat he wears black cotton, the shirt soaked against his skin, the front open enough to reveal too much of his chest for more than just a glimpse. I swallow inaudibly, staring, shaking, thinking how much more menacing he now seems. And that's before he throws off the shirt!

"Bu...but WHY are you undressing?!" It's not any naivety that makes me ask that, but alarm. I can all to easily hazard a guess as to his intentions, and everything inside me tightens and twists with my anxiety.

"I'm not about to catch my death from the storm." Is his answer. Killian looks at me and frowns. "I'm not about to let you do the same." In response, I cross my arms over my chest, hugging myself for warmth and protection from his glare.

"I'm prepared to take my chances."

"Well I am not." Killian retorts. "I won't let you cost me my vengeance against your father."

"Yes...about THAT." But he's not so easily deterred, Killian resting a hip against the room's table. I shake my head at his silent demand, and watched as his jaw clenches.

"I won't say it again. That dress comes off NOW."

"No." My open defiance can't last against him, especially when Killian palms a dagger from his shiny black boot. Before I can do much more than blink, much more than inhale to scream, he is on me, the dagger's tip against my throat.

"Go...go ahead." I goad him in a quivering tone of voice. "Kill me. End this, but leave my kingdom out of any further revenge you might wish to take on my father."

"Oh no, love. I'm not going to kill you." His breath is warm, and smells faintly like ground mint. "Though I'm afraid to rest of the world, you're as good as dead already..."

"What purpose does that serve except to plunge Avonlea into a war it cannot win? Why do you hate my father so? Why endanger a whole kingdom worth of people...?"

"So many questions princess. So much concern for others. Is it real, or is it just for show?" He asks.

"Of course it's real!" My voice is indignant then. "I've never pretended to be anything but what I truly am."

"That's more than your father can lay claim to." He grumbled.

"What is THAT supposed to mean? Killian...I beseech you. Tell me of this madness, this misdeed you think my father has done you?"

"I don't think it, I KNOW..." It's then that he catches at the collar of my dress with the dagger's tip. I make a noise in a protest, and he flashes me a smile that is hardly reassuring. "Careful love, or else my hand might slip..."

I actually contemplate risking it upon hearing the dress start to tear. The dagger is sharper than I am used to, able to cut through the thick velvet fabric of my dress with ease. Even the corset starts to give way as buttons pop almost violently, the pirate splitting my dress down the middle neatly. He tears me out of it the rest of the way with his hands, the dress in tatters, ruined with scraps of it laying on the floor. I'm left only in a plain white shift that is also soaked, and the thigh high stockings underneath it that act as covering for my legs. It's too menacing a situation, I'm too exposed, and he's half naked himself. I gasp and cringe, go to shove at him, only to find him pushing me down, the dagger to my throat once more.

To Be Continued...

Cliffhanger I know. I'm thinking next chapter will be a Killian POV, but I may come back and tinker with this chapter. We'll see how trying to start three will go. I may end up having to add more to the Belle POV after all...

Whoo I am tired...interesting how the chapter differed from my notes. Originally I thought Killian would be the one to explain about the pirates won't be allowed to have their fun until they're out of danger moment, but it just felt like a more natural thing to have it happen with the pirates in the hold.

Erg...almost four thirty, and I still have to spellcheck and proofread. _ Better get on it!

Laters!

-Michelle

Guest, thank you! I am trying...though I admit I am still playing bouncing ball with my fics. i.e. going from fic to fic trying to get inspired enough to stick with one for more than one or two chapters. ^^;;

Jewelzy, thanks! It was at least a year in the making. Just couldn't get it started the way I had originally wanted it to start..but I think what I ended up with, might be better than the trashed drafts I had attempted. :P

Once19, YES! I aim to please! Whoo hoo! And thanks!

Flowersandmagicspells, thank you! I'm glad you like it!

FemaleWraith, thank you!


	3. Chapter 3

There's the loud pop and clatter of buttons flying free, and the screaming protests of thick fabric being torn. Softer yet is the rustle of her skirts, and the slight inhale of breath that she takes. That breath pushes her chest up with that inhale, the thin shift that she wears beneath her corset straining in place over curves I can already tell are perfect. The look I steal only confirm that as fact, everything about her built to drive a man wild. Even that look in her eyes, that appealing mix of wide eyed innocence and fear, the princess trembling before me, and my blood is firing with a hard lust. It tries to steal all rhyme and reason from me, making me want her, and want her bad.

For one moment she is not my enemy. The blood that runs through her veins is forgotten, HE is forgotten, the lust making me focus on one and only one thing. She is MINE. By the rights of the sea, by the pirate's law I lay claim to, this princess belong to me. There's not a damn thing that she, that anyone can do, this woman a treasure I will fight and kill to keep. The spell is then broken, the momentary madness of my lust, chased away by her hands. By the princess attempting to shove me away from her. Rage fills me then, borne not just on the thought of her attempts at denial, but at myself, this lust a sickness that I need to be rid of and rid of NOW.

Reminding myself of just WHO she is, and WHAT she represents, my dagger is back at her throat. She goes down with my shove, the sharp teeth of the dagger barely a hair's breath from her skin. I'm on my knees, thighs spread wide to straddle her waist. I expect her to scream, to panic and fight, but I am unprepared for the look that she gives me instead. That blue eyed defiance, her chin lifting stubbornly. In that moment I acknowledge she's not only beautiful but brave, and wired with a stubbornness that could be detrimental to her own good.

"So brave, so fierce." I mutter it, teasing the knife against her throat. "Do you even realize the danger that you're in?"

"I realize it just fine." Her expression doesn't lose her defiant spark, even as there is a weary resignation in her voice. "You mean to kill me or worse..."

"Or worse." I agree, and flash a smirk at her. Her skin can't get any paler, not even at the menace of that look, or the words I now say. "Tell me princess...what way best to use you to ruin your father's life?"

"Besides disrupting the alliance he is trying to forge? I can think of NONE." She lets out a sigh, which makes her breasts heave enticingly. "I'm afraid there is no love lost between us. You'd have no better a bargaining chip than if you had stolen some scullery maid from my father's own kitchens. That is how LITTLE I mean to him."

She doesn't sound bitter, just matter of fact about the position she lacks in her own father's heart. "Killian, please..." She starts to add, and I snap out in interruption.

"That's Captain to you."

"Fine." Her lips purse together as though she has tasted something sour. "Captain. Find another way. Find a way that won't cost countless innocents their lives."

"I'm afraid your father has already cast the die in favor of that." I retort. "Or do you not know what dear old daddy has been up to?"

"I haven't seen let alone talked to my father in years. I have no say in what he does, no power, no choice in all this. I'm a pawn, his, yours, it matters not..."

"Am I to pity you then?" My mocking tone earns me her glare.

"I doubt the man you have become has room in his heart to pity anyone." Her haughty tone doesn't try to sugar coat the words. "Killian, what has happened to you? What happened to the kind boy I once knew..."

"Don't pretend any friendship with me!" I snap then. "And don't pretend you've ever known me!"

"But I did!" She protests. "I've never forgotten the boy that you were. The kind, sympathetic child who reached out to a little girl who had just lost her mother. That boy was the one bit of solace in an otherwise painful time. The only..."

"That boy is dead!" She quiets with a gasp, the dagger now pressed against her throat hard enough that she bleeds. It's just a thin trickle of her blood, but it's enough to leave me horrified on the inside. This is madness of the worst kind, this woman making me forget myself. First with that lust that still fists in deep, and then with the anger, that wild burst of fury making me attack her. She's too much a danger, the feelings that she gives rise to inside of me, too volatile and unpredictable. And ever so unwanted. I feel my own gaze narrow down at her, the red hot anger inside me turning to something colder.

She's uneasy with that look, and with the tight lipped smile that I give her. I make a sound, a soft chiding noise as I ease the dagger from her throat. There's that thin thread of her blood on it, a thin thread that smears onto the white color of her soaked shift. My smile becomes more pronounced, the dagger's tip easing under the fabric that strains in place in a vain attempt to keep her covered. Her chest heaves on a panicked breath, the one betraying motion of an otherwise steely eyed mask, the princess either too proud or too stubborn to beg. I'm torn between admiration and annoyance, marveling at her bravado and in turn irritated by it. I almost want to hear her cry out for mercy, some primal part of my brain craving it, craving each and every sound I can tease out of those bow shaped lips.

It's not just the scream that I want. That realization has me angry for I should know better. She's the daughter of a murderer, of a man who would have genocide over half the kingdoms in his mad quest for more riches and more power. For that alone I should hate her, the blood that runs through her veins something to be despised. And yet she's such a beguiling, confusing mix, all naive innocence and stubborn spirit. There's probably not a treacherous bone in her body, the woman clean of this, clean of the corruption and filth, the crimes and misdeeds of her would be tyrant father. Her good nature and inherent innocence won't be enough to keep Maurice from using her. From making her yet another pawn that he uses to gain foothold to more of everything.

It's what he's good at. Using people. Using them to get what he wants, then sweeping their remains under a rug. He'll do exactly the same to his daughter. Just like he did to my brother and me. The memory of Liam's cold, lifeless body, the light gone from his eyes, is all the justification that I need. I use the dagger, that violent motion neatly rendering the shift to pieces. I don't get the scream, I don't even get her gasp, the princess biting down on her lip. It doesn't matter, or so I tell myself, watching as her breasts heave with her panicked breaths. It's downright hypnotic, the slight bounce and sway of them, the way she quivers and tries to hold absolutely still. I find myself wetting my lips in response, an anticipatory lust shivering through me, as I wonder just what brand of sweet intoxicating flavor she'll be.

Again I lick my lips, wanting and knowing I'd never stop at just a taste, I'm at war with myself. The right and wrong of it, the temptation that she brings, the distraction that she is, it makes it harder and harder to remember the honorable man I had once tried to be. The good person that I had been, the devoted brother that I STILL am, their voices are all but drowned out by the greedy voice of the pirate that I've made myself become. It's the pirate that goes to reach for her, that extends fingers to brush against one rosy nipple. She's stiff not from any arousal, but from her freezing, wet state, and I'm almost too far gone to care.

"He's not dead." I have to lean in closer to make out those quiet words. "I still believe. Still believe he's somewhere inside you."

My thumb and forefinger rub together, tearing a reaction out of her. The princess flinches, actually cringes back from that caress. "Why would you think that?" I ask her.

"Kindness like that doesn't just disappear over night." She says.

"No, it doesn't" Her surprise doesn't last long, my smile somewhere between melancholy and ruthless. "It has to be beaten and buried."

"My father..." I nod to that, still playing my fingers' caress on the very tips of her breasts. "Whatever he did...it can't change the core of who YOU are. The boy who..."

"Stop clinging to a fantasy!" I snap and pinch her.

"Is it a fantasy? The man who showed mercy today? Who gave those women a choice..."

"Some choice." I retort, but my fingers are back to caressing over the very spot I had just pinched.

"You gave them more than a choice." She insists. "You gave them a chance." I arch my brow at that, a do tell expression on my face. "I know of your rules. That your men are not to take their fun until the danger is passed..."

"That's not kindness, that's practicality." I can't help but snort. "Most of the fools would have otherwise chosen the women over securing the ship against the storm." I am still touching her, an absent minded caress of fingers that sends shivers of awareness through us both. "No princess, I'm afraid neither you nor I have done those women any favor in bringing them aboard this ship."

Her already troubled expression clouds over, the princess mulling my words over. Her breathing continues in that unsteady rhythm, Belle trying for an indifference she does not feel in the onslaught of my fingers rubbing pressure against her taut skin. My smile remains, the smirk a twist of pleasure expressed at how silk soft she feels, my fingers petting extending past her nipple to the breast itself. Her pale skin is so milky white a contrast to my own tan colored flesh, the fat globes of her nicely sized breasts a pleasing weight in the palm of my hand. I feel an odd mix of calm and restless, the act of touching her having two stark contrasts of feeling hit me. That wild play of need should be at war with the almost lethargic ease that settles within me, that strong lust that I feel something that is meant to consume everything and anything caught in it's path. Her, me, we should all be kindle to the flame of it, the need born of it something that can't, that WON'T Be controlled.

My dagger back to her throat as the one and only warning for her to behave, I shift on top of her. My other hand slips around to her back, pressing fingers against the small of it. She arches up in surprise, her beautiful breasts thrust up just a little, and I close the gap the rest of the way by leaning down towards them.

"I'll make you a deal!" She suddenly cries out, her skin awash with the tiny ripples of goose flesh erupting across it. My breath the catalyst for that display, I can't stop from planting a kiss over the top most flesh of her right breast. I hear her inhale, the sound a strangled, scandalized gasp. "A deal!" She repeats, all a quiver beneath me as I lose myself to the discovery that the princess is as soft to my lips as she was to my fingers.

"A deal?" An arch of my brow, my eyes surely dancing with my amusement. "You have nothing that I can't just TAKE."

"That's not true!" She protests, and I thought it impossible, but she trembles all the more. "You can't command my obedience! Not in this, not in ANYTHING!"

"That dagger at your throat begs to differ." I point out with a soft chuckle.

Her eyes narrow, the defiant anger in them lending a regal air to her otherwise disheveled state. "I'll plunge it into your back the first chance I get unless you at least listen to my deal!"

Her words give me pause, not so much the threat of them but the spirit in which she speaks. This one's a firebrand, her blue eyes flashing with the strength of her heart and her soul deep inside.

"Go on." I say, easing back slightly with both my body and my dagger.

"I...I'll do what you want." The words trouble her to voice, her throat visibly working to swallow. But she doesn't back down, doesn't give in to whatever voice in her head makes her doubt. "WHATEVER you want."

I don't mock her with the fact she'll do it regardless, nor do I bother to remind her of just who is in command here of this situation. "And just what will it cost me?" I tap the dagger's tip not at her throat, but between her breasts now. "A return trip to your kingdom, your father spared? No princess, as appealing as the idea of your obedience might be, I'm afraid there is NOTHING that can divert him off the course of my vengeance."

"Not for me, and not for him!" She cries it out in a strong tone of voice, Belle's blue eyes sparking with her determination. "But for the women brought on board this ship."

She's finally done it. Finally surprised me to the point I just kneel there atop her and stare. "Please..." the princess entreats in a breathy whisper. "Help me help THEM."

"They know too much to ever be set free."

"Then spare them your crew's lust at least!" She dares reach out a hand toward me, her trembling fingers touching the side of my stubble covered cheek. "KIllian-Captain, PLEASE!"

I suddenly can't get off her fast enough. I move as though burnt, as though the hounds of the hell I am sure that I am destined for nip at my heels. They don't, there's nothing here but a mere slip of a woman, a princess who is proving anything but self absorbed and spoiled. I don't understand her, don't understand how HIS daughter can be so kind, so concerned for the others. She is nothing like I had expected, nothing like HIM, no artifice or cold calculation in her.

"Captain?" She's sitting up, making no move to use the torn remains of her shift. Any other woman I would have accused as trying to seduce me, of trying to cloud my mind in order to sway me to her demands.

"You'd bring mutiny to my ship." I glare at her now. "If I do this..."

"If?" she seizes on the word. "Then you're considering it?!"

"I'd be a fool to." I say it, but there's no real conviction to back my words. "The men..."

"They'll be upset, I know."

"Upset doesn't begin to cover what they would be." I snort my response. "Their murderous nature will be made worst by their thwarted lust."

She's biting at her lip now, the worried look in her eyes offset by that sharp determination. "But..if you make them understand..."

"Understand what?!" I interrupt. "That's we've a hold full of women that they can't touch?!"

"That too...but I was thinking more the fact you'll be having to make land soon."

"Oh, we'll be having to, will we?" I demand, crossing my arms over my broad chest. "And what makes you think THAT?"

"I've seen your ship's hold, made fat with plunder." Belle explains. "You've been a very busy pirate, but you can't continue for much longer. Not with that amount of treasure weighing you down, affecting your ship's ability for speed and maneuverability. No, you'll have to make port soon, especially if you think to out sail my father's fleet."

She's impressed me, the princess as smart as she is beautiful. "Aye we'll be making for the cove soon..."

"The cove?" But I don't try to explain. The less she knows about that place, the better.

"And maybe, just maybe, something can be worked out between my crew and the women." She doesn't quite smile, but she lights up with hope all the same. "No promises, your highness." I hold up a hand. "The cove's a few days journey from here, and anything can happen in that time..."

"All I ask is that you try...!"

"And all I'll ask of YOU is.." I've gone and walked back to her, holding out my hand. She stares not at it, but at me, her trembling fingers gently touching my hand as though she knows the deal she is sealing. "To get in my bed, and WAIT for me."

She blinks repeatedly in confusion, and then I am hauling her up off the floor. The remains of the shift falls, leaving her clad in just panties and white stockings. The lust that's never left me, hits me harder than ever, leaving my staggered with how desperately I want this woman. It's all I can do not to throw her against the table, to not just take what I need from between those cream colored thighs of hers.

"Wait for me..." I repeat, and press a finger against her lips. She take the cue to be silent, but her eyes still hold the question, Belle wondering just what I am going to go do. I wish I knew, but the answer is not coming easy to me. It's a whole world of trouble I've invited, just the presence of one woman enough to make my men crazed. But a whole group of women denied them? It's a recipe for murder and mayhem of the worst kind! And yet one look into her eyes, into that blue shining so hopeful with her trust and belief, and I realize I'll do just about anything not to crush it.

To Be Continued...

Hoo boy...this didn't go anything like my notes. But I like it, think it flowed well. I'm a little sad it deviated from my notes so much. I blame it on a relative upsetting me...think my upset with that relative affected my writing, made me have Killian be more menacing with that dagger! :O

Can't think of anything else to say...maybe I'll think of something more after I am done spell checking and proofreading. But all and all I am pretty happy with this chapter, and I hope you readers are too!

-Michelle

Jenna, thank you! Reviews like the one you left me make it so worth it! I adore my readers, especially when you guys and gals take the time to comment. Hoping this chapter also helps, and hoping you haven't had another exhausting day!

Woilada, thank you! :) I was looking forward to getting his POV started...Hope it didn't disappoint. Thanks again! And next chapter SHOULD be another Killian POV, unless some weird monkey wrench in my own plans happens...

Once19, I adore Ruby! I so ship a one sided secret love feels for her and an oblivious Belle. Heh...I have often thought about my trade off fic, joked that Belle should ditch both Hook and Rumple for Ruby in that one! Anyway, getting off subject of THIS fic. More Ruby to come. How much I am not sure, but I wanted to make sure Belle made a female friend or two, and who better than Ruby?! And as always, happy you are enjoying, thanks for reading and reviewing so diligently. :D It is appreciated! 


	4. Chapter 4

There's a barely leashed anger inside me, a simmering rage that is not cooled one bit by my lust. I watch as the woman, the princess, makes a mad dash towards my bed. Clad in little more than a pair of thin white stockings, and a flimsy pair of panties that hug her heart shaped derriere, it is exactly that kind of sight that makes my already fierce lust fist stronger inside me. I can feel the front of my trousers, feel how that soaked leather fabric strains a snug fit over my groin. The uncomfortable feel of it, and that of my trapped desire, makes my teeth grind together, a growl escaping despite the clenching of my lips.

The harshness of that feral sound, it draws her to a halt, the princess' fingers frozen where she has now gripped hold of a blanket. She has turned enough so that I can see that pretty face of hers now, those blue eyes wide with fright and uncertainty, and holding a complete lack of understanding. I nearly laugh then to see it, but there would be no joy in that sound. There almost never is, true happiness a sensation, a feeling, that has long evaded my grasp. I don't have to wonder how long it has been, not when I can count down to the very second such emotion died within me, that feeling and my sanity soon following after it.

Such things long buried, the rage and the hostility inside me, that burning need for vengeance, has been the only thing keeping me going. For years now, I have not dared dream or hope of anything else, my every conscious thought built on my need to avenge the wrongs done to me. With revenge fueling my blood, with hatred in my heart, the lust that has it's grip upon me is an unwelcome and startling a surprise. It's not supposed to be this way. I am not supposed to want her even half as much as I find myself now actually doing. It doesn't matter that she is beautiful, that her body is so unbelievably sexy. She is the blood of HIS Blood, and for that reason alone I should hate her.

With another growl ground out from between my lips, I snatch hold of my sword. Her look becomes even more pronounced in alarm, the princess surely thinking the worst yet of me. She'd not be that far off, though I doubt her relatively innocent mind could fathom the true depth of depravity that monsters like myself and her father are capable of. But she will learn soon enough, and it will be by my hands that she is taught.

The thought of her education gives me more pleasure than it should. I am not a man accustomed to forcing himself on a woman, on ANY woman, but for the princess, I might almost make an exception. And that too makes me angry, the princess having no right to make me want her in this way. So what that she is insanely beautiful, and that she makes my blood boil with need. Raping her had never been part of the plan, but then very little of tonight has been going according to my schemes.

With one last sour faced glower at her, I turn and march out of the cabin. There's no real need to lock the door behind me, not when her clothing lays in tattered pieces on the floor, and yet I do it all the same. It's not her I am lacking the faith in, but my crew, the princess simply too tempting a morsel to leave unguarded against them, even with a hold full of captured women. Already a few men find reason to linger in the hall outside my cabin, and I feel their shrewd eyes not so much on me, but on the key that I pocket.

Naked sword in my hand as both a potent threat and a reminder of just who is captain here, I shout at them to get back to work. They are so visibly disappointed that I find myself snarling under my breath. "A hold full of woman, and yet they have to be after MINE." That then gives me pause, that sudden possessiveness as unwelcome and as unwanted as the lust, the princess' sweetly sensual appeal working to cast a spell over me. I fight it, and fight her, determined to not feel, to not want anything but her father's head on a platter. But not even that will appease me. I don't want to just kill Maurice, I want to make him suffer. To have him tortured in a way that exceeds any and all of my own pain and damage. I want him ruined, I want him destitute, and I want him hated and hunted for the rest of his miserable life.

His daughter key to at least part of that, has earned a place on my ship where as the women in the hold have not. They are an unwanted, unneeded baggage that is sure to complicate everything. I am uneasy with their mere presence on board my ship, with what the desire for them will cause my men to do. Kinder would have been to have killed them, and yet the princess had begged for not only their lives, but their virtue. The first I could have written off for selfish motives, reasoning that what sane woman would want to remain on board a pirate ship all alone, but then to go so far as to barter away her body and her obedience? It was astounding, my mind boggled, unable to reconcile the idea that such a selfless princess could exist, let alone share the same blood and lineage of that selfish a king.

My head hurts with the attempt to make sense of it, my thoughts spiraling away from me on the sound of a woman's scream. That shrill sound was then repeated, louder than any of the men's shouts. It deafened me to the words that were being spoken, to everything but the fact that a good number of my crew had gathered in the hold. I bite back a curse of my own, my fingers tightening their hold on my sword, while the thump of my booted feet hitting the wooden planks of the steps at a neat, resounding clip is lost to the scream, to the volatile mood down below.

All but flying those last steps down to the hold, expecting the worst and coming away unprepared for what I did find, it was not an all and out rape and debauchery I had came across. For one thing my men were fully dressed, though I did spy the unbuckled belts about the waists of more then a few of the pirates. But for all their eager and aroused state, none of them were between the legs of the woman that was STILL screaming. Instead they milled about, angry and agitated, some pounding their clenched fists on the door that should have led deeper into the hold. The screaming came from behind that closed door, the female frantic, and faintly, underneath her shrieking voice, I could hear the other women speaking, many of them trying for a soothing, nonsensical cadence in an effort to calm down the worst of their hysterical friend's fears.

From the sound of it, they weren't having much luck in that endeavor, the wild screaming continuing. It seemed to grow worse in response to the pounding of fists, and the pirate's rattling attempts to force open the door. It was then that I understood what was happening, my lips fighting not to twitch with amusement. The women hadn't been content to wait for the imagined worst to happen, they had used the very things inside the hold to stand firm against my crew. It was a desperate kind of genius, their fright and self preservation lending the women the strength needed to move enough heavy things to barricade the door against it's opening.

"You can't stay in there forever!" One of my men was growling, as his fists pounded harder against the door. "Sooner or later..."

"You've no room to bargain!" Added another, but for all the violent attacks against it, the door held strong.

"Come out and make things easy on yourselves!" A third man shouted.

"Not before hell freezes over!" Came a fierce shout, the woman's voice a calm sound compared to that of her companion's screaming.

"You'll eat those words before the night is through!" One of the men threatened, a loud, resounding cry taking up amongst the crew, as they laughed and jeered in agreement. The wild screaming seemed to intensify in response, the sound of it only heightening the tension of everyone, no matter what side of the door that they happened to stand on. It was abundantly clear that I had my work cut out for me, both in calming the women down, and in reasoning with my own men.

The odds against me on both sides, I slammed a fist against the wall. Alone, it added only so much more noise to the sounds of many hands banging on the shut door, but my voice, barking out at it's loudest, and in the most commanding of tones, drew attention to my arrival. And once my presence amongst them was realized, a kind of collective shout broke through the men's anger.

"Captain!"

There was more than one relieved look on their faces, as though the men thought I held all the answers to their prayers. As if they believed I could somehow magic the door open, or use my considerable charm to seduce the women into willingly submitting to their intended rapes. But I was no worker of miracles, no God among men. I was nothing more than their flesh and blood captain, whose schemes of the night had gone awry in more ways than one.

Counting off all the ways in my head, starting off with the princess' first plea for mercy that had resulted in the stand off before me, I let my foul mood show. The anger that colored my eyes, the scowl that twisted on my lips, the ramrod tension of my body, all this lent my presence the fury that I needed to let my displeasure be known. My crew who had looked so relieved just seconds earlier, now turned uncertain, some shuffling in place, others actually stepping away from the door. I took a step forward, and it was as though the crowd itself parted, the men hurrying out of my way.

I glowered at each and every man there, and in turn, they all took in my appearance, from my half naked state, to the sword in my hand, to the aroused flesh bulging noticeably against the leather of my pants. I let them see the state I was in, let them know that I was not any more satisfied then any one of them. I didn't give them time to wonder, to speculate on why. Instead I took center stage in the hold's drama, sneering my displeasure to all ears' within reach.

"I understand congratulations are in order." A pause and then I continued. "You've made an already tense situation, an out and outright mess." A few gazes narrowed in response to that. "They're NEVER going to open that door now. And do you know why? Because you have them so thoroughly, so absolutely terrified of your intentions, and frankly I cannot blame them."

"What did you expect us to do?" A voice that was insolent at best, spat out in response. "You can't bring aboard such an abundance of booty, and ask us to WAIT."

"And where has your lack of patience gotten you? Have any of you had satisfaction this eve? Hmm?"

"The night is still early." Came the protest. It was accompanied by many a nod.

"Your lust has made you optimistic...when the reality is a far different truth." I let out a harsh, chiding sound. "Congratulations, you have let a bunch of women defeat the scourge of the realm's seas." A rumble of dissent rose through the crowd. "Oh, you think I exaggerate?" I let my eyebrows convey the mocking disregard I now held for my crew. "Perhaps you think the women will have to come out sooner than later? That they will wither away and starve...Ah but from the way most of you are nodding, I see that is EXACTLY what you think." It was no act, the disappointment that I voiced.

"Branson!" I suddenly snapped out a name. "How much food do you estimate the kitchen currently holds?"

"Erm..." The man had to pause to think about it. "If everyone eats the bare minimum? Maybe five days..."

"Five days...when we have enough food and water stored in the hold to last us WEEKS. Weeks! These women are in no danger of dying from thrist and starvation any time soon. Worst yet, they KNOW it."

Anger gave way to uncertainty then, several of the crew exchanging side long glances with one another. "Captain, then what are you saying?"

"He's not saying much of anything!" protested the most insolent of my crew. "He's as much at a loss as any of you!"

The crowd parted once more, this time retreating away from a pirate whose scowl nearly matched fury with my own. I locked eyes with his one, and gave the slightest nod of my head. "And you, Hackersin? You think you have a better idea as to what to do?"

"I know it for fact." He smiled, and it was all pearl and gold colored teeth that showed in that lecherous grin. "If the women won't come to us, we MAKE them."

"But how?" A pirate, young Thomas wanted to know. "If the captain says they have what amount to weeks worth of food and water..."

"Oh aye, they may indeed have that." nodded Hackersin. "But, can they really in good conscience, enjoy their limited freedom when it comes at the cost of one of their own?"

The smiles that followed those words sent a chill through me, my vision swimming red with my rage as I acknowledged what Hackersin was implying. "I have my own plans for the princess."

"Oh yes, I am quite sure." Hackersin agreed, to the laughing cheers of my randy crew. "But whether on her back or on her knees, forty men can ruin a princess just as well as one man can."

I lost control then, shoving at a man who had foolishly dared step in my way, as I went for Hackersin's throat. Hackersin just barely got a sword up in time, the metal of our blades sparking in the dark of the hold, and around us I could hear other weapons being drawn.

"I'll kill every last one of you before I let you filth lay a hand on the princess!" I saw the sparks and spittle fly, my angered strength forcing Hackersin back a step and then another, and another until his back hit against the wall. And still he fought me, while needing both hands to hold onto his weapon.

"He's gone mad!" Hackersin cried out, then amended. "Well madder than usual..." Already there showed signs of strain on him, his arms fighting to keep my blade back. Around me fighting was heard, not all of the crew yet ready to side with Hackersin over this.

"We'll just have a taste!" Hackersin cried out in a desperate tone of voice, but it was not I who the man was trying to appeal to. "One taste, one scream, and we'll let the women decide the rest..."

"Captain, what would be the harm?" I heard young Thomas ask. The lovely, young princess and her perfectly formed body flashed to vivid life in my mind, such a sight and a memory, a treasure that was mine alone to behold.

"NO!" I bared all my teeth in a feral snarl. The sounds of the fighting grew more wild around me, and somewhere to the right of me I heard a dying man's groan. I didn't take my eyes off of Hackersin, watching as the whites of his one remaining eye started to bleed through. And then I was spinning in place, blocking the dagger thrown my way. A blade from behind then bit into my shoulder, a grunt of pain erupting from my throat as I turned again, Hackersin's wheezing attempt at laughter dying down short as I ran my blade straight through to his black heart.

"You would have never been satisfied with just one taste." I told him, and just as cruelly, jerked my sword free of his chest. He coughed and gagged on mouthfuls of blood, his sword arm falling limply to his side, his other hand clutching at the wound that gaped open in his chest.

"Now..." I sounded far too calm, given the chaos and fury swirling to life in my head. "Those who stand with me, will be justly rewarded. The rest of you however, won't make it out of this room alive."

Screams and questions erupted around me, many of my men killing one another, while wondering what this just reward could actually be.

To Be Continued...

I know...abrupt ending, but I am really hating on this chapter. I have been struggling to write it in a believable way, and feel it just sucks more and more. I'll spoil, but basically Killian is going to pay the survivors a handsome sum to keep their hands off the women in the hold for the three days it takes to get to the pirate's cove. But I really hate this chapter, and feel this is such an inferior quality example of my writing. but I can't seem to do any better. This is like the fifth attempt too...

In other new, lot of craziness going on in my life. Long story short, my dad nearly died. he went into cardiac arrest, and they thought he was gonna be brain fried but then he pulled some kind of miracle and woke up...but there is all this crazy drama around him cause of neighbors and friends, and I have been just so stressed out by all this, so no writing has been happening. And every time it seems to calm down, something else upsetting happens involving him and them. So that's why I haven't been updating anything in so long...=_=

I also don't think I did a good job to establish in this chapter Killian's mental state. I won't spoil why, but let's just say he is mentally unbalanced. How unhinged remains to be seen, and it doesn't all have to do with Liam dying.

I probably could ramble on more, but right now I feel so exhausted and stressed that I can't remember what else I might have wanted to say in the author's note. Maybe I'll come back and add to this chapter. Or maybe I wont, and just pick up with Killian returning to his cabin and explaining to Belle what went down. I don't know for sure right now. I'm just so stressed from battling myself to make this chapter read even halfway good. =/ And I do want to try and update some of my other Hook Belle stories, though right now your guess is as good as mine as to which one will be next!

Laters!

-Michelle

Woilada, thank you! I am so happy you liked his POV in three so much! I probably disappointed you with this chapter though. but hopefully future chapters will be better AND easier on me!

Once19, thank you! Ah Trade Off. I have several drafts of that one, for the latest chapter...but I am always being too much of a perfectionist to like anything I have tried to write for it. Sad fact, I have tried updating that one, have actually reread it several times, and I always end up failing at writing the next chapter in a way that I like and can live with. But I really, really want to update it someday! It's actually been on my mind a lot to try and force out a chapter for it anyway! Anyway, for the untitled pirate au fic, expect Ruby to have more scenes! I have plans for her!

Actually I am a little mad and frustrated, cause in my notes, I wanted Ruby and Killian to have some kind of interaction, where he privately notes that she's trouble. But I didn't get to put that in this chapter. But in my head, Ruby is the leader of the women in the hold, instigating the whole let's barricade ourselves in with the treasure and supplies movement! XD

Female wraith, ha ha, seems that way doesn't it! But for how long?! XD

Elite Wolf, thank you! Always happy to have a new reader on board, and oh my, new to the pairing too? Awesome! Doubly awesome!

Sunny bird, thanks! Sorry for the wait...real life sucks at times. =/

Miss Jones, OMG! I am blushing with happiness after I read your comments. Thank you so much! And yes, I have been loving the captain beauty scenes we are getting. Though I wish they had been shipmates longer, and we could have gotten some scenes of them both rooming on the Roger together!

Guest, you're a clear attempt at a flame, and make so ridiculous a claim, that I can't take you seriously.


	5. Chapter 5

My heart has been racing at a steady clip, it's beat a frightened tempo that only grows more frantic with every passing second. The fear that causes my heart's erratic rhythm, works to chip away at my mask, that unflinching, unflappable bravery all but crumbling apart the instant HE leaves the room. The door slamming shut behind him, and the sound of a lock being engaged, at last permit me the first real cower of the evening, my eyes welling up with so many tears, as my body starts to tremble uncontrollably. That violent shaking makes me clumsy, my fingers fumbling their grip on the blanket that I am trying to wrap around my body. I swaddle myself in it's velvet embrace, then let out a hiss of displeasure at the feel of that soft, furred like fabric against my bare skin. Its a sensation unlike anything I am used to, the velvet brushing against my naked flesh and the overly sensitive tips of my breasts. Immediate is the memory, the fear and the feelings aroused by a moment that had just taken place minutes earlier, the remembered feel of his fingers pinch and caress, and the moist kisses he had pressed into my skin.

I run hot and cold together, my body shivering with a fevered warmth. I want to throw the blanket off of me, to shake free of the velvet that both teases and tantalizes my skin into a physical memory. One that has my skin crawling with unease, as the enormity of what I have agreed to, hits me harder than ever. I hold back a soft sob, and fight the tears that try to overflow. In this moment I am not the brave, caring princess, but simply a frightened girl, one who has no need or reason to pretend. And with that, I break, grabbing for one of the bed's many pillows, and using that soft lump to muffle the worst of my sobbing sounds.

I don't know how long that I cry for. But the worst of my heart ache has passed. I'm still scared, still so terribly frightened, but already I am building up my mask. I pull the remnants together, my composure made up in parts false bravado, stoicism, and a good dash of determined. I remember who I am, WHAT I am, a princess, a noble, my body born and bred for such a sacrifice. Be it for the fate of a million, or for just a small handful of terrified women, whether it be the pirate or some King, my innocence's blood had always been destined to spill. There had never been a chance for me, never a real choice, such things as love and preference reserved for those born of more lucky a lineage.

Resigned to it, to a life lacking of love and choice, I still can't help the envious feelings that curl up within me. Not for the first time do I find myself wishing for something else, for some other life than that of a neglected princess and helpless pawn. But nothing changes. Nothing EVER does. I'm all too aware of my lack of power, of my inability to truly change the set course of my destiny.

It's a weary acceptance I've long since nurtured. It and these realizations have been there in one form or another, ever since I was a young girl of eight mourning the loss of my one real source of comfort. My mother, that one real taste of familial love, struck down in the prime of her life. Taken from me when I had needed her most, her death had been but the first of a harsh string of life lessons. From the father who could not love me, from the loss of the only homes I had ever known, to the sight of all those men who had died on this day, the pirate, Killian, is just the latest in a long line of disappointments.

As disappointed and as frightened as I am, I can't help but be curious. Can't help but wonder about the man, and the boy he had once been. That kind, empathetic boy, the only one to have dared reach out to me in my moment of despair, what had happened to him? What had changed him, corrupted him, made him into that monster of a man? A cold, unfeeling terror who had killed so many, and stood poised to devastate kingdoms with this night's act. And how did my father factor into all of this? I simply did not know, simply could not imagine the kind of answer needed to justify such an extreme act of vengeance. it wasn't just my father alone who would suffer for Killian's revenge, it was Avonlea, a whole kingdom's worth of people to fall victim to a war.

It's a war that my marriage might have helped avert. The House of Hunters was powerful, their name alone inspiring great fear and respect. The alliance my marriage would have sealed, the threat of the kind of king Gaston was rumored to be, might have not just lessened the war, but outright STOPPED it. All chance of that was lost now, sunk to the bottom of the sea along with the ships that had made up my escort, I might as well be as dead as Killian wanted the world to believe.

But I wasn't. I lived, breathed, and was terrified. My immediate future loomed before me, made all the more vivid a fear by the memory of his finger's caress and his lips' kiss. By the play of his dagger, and that mad look of unbridled lust on his face, I could no longer claim to be a complete innocent. Branded by him, I now knew the frightening touch of a man, and though I knew not the explicit details of such intimacy, my frazzled mind attempted to guess at what else he could and would attempt to do.

Such attempts at imagining the act, only left me feeling all the more vulnerable. I shivered and shook anew, pulled tighter around me the velvet covering, and wondered if Killian would at all be gentle. Could a hand that so casually killed even be capable of that? Or was violence the only way left to him, left to US, now? I didn't know, so many uncertain what ifs alive in my head. They prodded and picked away at my mask, my bravery starting to go long before I heard the clear sound of the lock turning in the door.

Still wrapped in that velvet cocoon, I felt my back stiffen with fear and then with my displeasure. I would not cower in front of him! I would NOT! I would be brave, I would be determined, and most of all I would be indifferent to anything that he could say or do to me. I had already survived torture at his hands, had not cried out when the dagger had tore through my gown and the shift beneath it. I would survive this, I would survive HIM, my chin lifting stubbornly, so that my bravery and defiance would be the first thing that Killian would see of me upon entering the room.

Readying myself for the sight of him, I was not prepared for the reality. For his storm angry gaze, and the scowl that twisted the corners of his mouth. He was so angry, his mood more volatile than I could have anticipated. I didn't understand, couldn't fathom a real reason behind such anger so clearly directed my way. Should not Killian be happy about what he was about to do, what he was about to have? Confused, it was all I could do not to flinch when he slammed the cabin door shut behind him.

Every stomp of his booted feet on the rug covered floor, rattled and jarred my nerves something senseless. I was fighting not to cringe, to not gasp or scream, my anxiety mounting and that was before he began to undo his belt's buckle. My own knuckles went white from the force in which I gripped the blanket closed around me, watching as Killian then kicked off his boots. Each one hit the floor hard, as though the pirate was trying to expend the worst of his anger with such violent action. Tried and was so clearly failing, the pirate stalking towards then past the bed, and my eyes widen in shock and dismay.

He was HURT. This much was now apparent, even in the dim glow of the enchanted blue light of the room. This close I could see the wounds, see the fresh blood marring his body. I started to make some sound, some rattling noise that died in my throat, when he bent and shimmied out of his leather pants. The sound locked in my throat, my mouth dry with my shock, I couldn't help taking in that first sight of unobstructed male beauty. And he was a thing of beauty, even bloodied and injured as he was, his strong back slick with blood and cuts, his thighs thick and muscular, and the tight, chiseled perfection of his rear. My mouth opened on a sigh of appreciation that was distorted, the gasp not quite voiced as I stared at him and noticed older wounds that the blood couldn't quite cover, a criss cross of many scarred lines of flesh.

"Killian, what has happened to you?!" I couldn't help asking. My voice was a hoarse whisper, but that quiet sound he had heard all the same. He glanced over his shoulder at me, the movement drawing my eyes almost guiltily up from their perusal of his body. Was that cold amusement in his gaze? Did he guess at my admiration for his body, even wounded as he so clearly was?

"This?" He inquired, in a deep, resonant tone. "This is proof of accomplishing the impossible."

"The impossible?" I blinked rapidly in confusion.

His smile was sardonic, Killian watching me carefully. "The mercy that you asked for." His clarification dawned a realization in me, a hope I hadn't dared fully nurture. I nearly wilted then and there, the relief hitting me hard. Such a reaction was misunderstood by him, Killian asking me if I regretted the deal that I had made.

"Of course I don't!" I snapped at him angrily. "Those women are SAFE, free from your crew's lust and abuse! If I could play a part in ANY way to ensure that, I'd gladly do it all over again."

"I am sure that will be a cold comfort to you in the coming days and nights." His callous remark surely made the remaining color leech out my skin, my fingers tightening on the velvet fabric, clutching the blanket as tight around me as it could possibly get without tearing.

"I haven't forgotten our bargain." I tell him, but my tone and my manner is defiant. My chin lifts with my stubborn pride, my anxiety flip flopping about in my belly as I try to relax my grip on the blanket. "I will pay your price."

He arches an eyebrow at me, as though in mocking challenge. I let out a steady breath, nerving myself to throw off the blanket. I can't quite maintain my glare, my face feeling hot with my shame and embarrassment as I expose myself to him. I then gasp, cause he is suddenly THERE, not just by the bed, but on it, looming over me with an absolutely furious expression on his face.

"Little fool!" Killian hisses down at me. I can only stare up at him, my eyes full of the fright and panic that his naked nearness inspires within me. Vaguely I am aware that no part of him makes contact with any part of my own body, and yet he is so close, that I can feel the heat and raw strength of him. "Do you not know what you risk in tempting me like this?!"

I'm almost dumb with terror, but not so far gone to it, as to be completely lost to what he is saying. "I am not trying to tempt you." I am proud of the calm, even tone with which I speak now. "I am merely fulfilling my half of our deal."

His gaze actually narrows even further, a small throbbing vein revealing itself against the corner of one temple. "Oh yes, you'll fulfill it. You will fulfill it and then some!"

"I won't deny that or YOU!" I retort back. "In this, you have my word...my word AND my obedience." A quick flick of my tongue moistens my dry lips. "I am YOURS. For how ever long you will have me."

I don't understand his expression, or that angry look that gleams in his eyes. Shouldn't a man be happy to have a woman pledge her body and her obedience to him, no matter the reason behind such a vow? Or does his hatred for my father warp even this much for him? The fear crosses my mind then, the thought that Killian might go out of his way to hurt me, in retaliation for whatever misdeed my father may or may not have done him.

"Please..." I say it a tad desperately, feeling tears prick at my eyes. "I won't fight...so please..."

His hand moves, and for a second I wonder if he intends to strike me. Instead an all too trembling finger is pressed against my lips, Killian's eyes closed as though he cannot bear even this much contact with me. I go silent at the touch, watching him, confused and frightened anew, trying to gleam some understanding from a mind that doesn't make any real sense to me.

"A man can only take so much." He mutters it as though it isn't for my ears to hear, and then Killian is gone. The bed feels lighter without his presence there on top of it, on top of me, and for one brief moment, I just stare up at the room's ceiling. A sound to the right of me, a rustle of fabrics, draws my attention, something hitting me square in the chest.

"Put this on." He snaps, not looking at me. I blink in slow repetition, before acknowledging what he had thrown at me. A man's shirt, his most likely, that large length of fabric guaranteed to cover me past my knees. I hear more sound, look towards the confusing sight of the pirate pulling on a fresh pair of pants. My clear lack of understanding leaves me slow to move, my body moving to pull on the shirt. I positively swim in it, the cuffs of the sleeves rolling past the tips of my fingers.

Confusion chases away the worst of my fear. What little I know of the intimate act, clothing has never played a huge factor in. So then...what was Killian's game? What was he on about? I didn't know, couldn't even fathom the motive behind such an action.

"Killian-Captain." In an uncertain tone, I correct myself. "What...?"

"Over here." He interrupts me, gesturing for me to follow him. Warily, I inch off the bed, more confused than ever. First we both get dressed, and now he has us moving away from the bed? It didn't make sense, none of it did, least of all HIM. Not until he opens a small wooden chest, and I spy the bottles and clean cloth and fabric bandages.

"Ah." A simple word, more a sound than anything. Killian nods, and takes a seat. "How badly are you hurt?"

"Worry not, I'll live." He says.

"I wasn't worried!" I retort, starting to open up the various bottles. Not all of them are labeled, and some aren't even medicines, but drinks, the smell of rum and brandy assaulting my nose, and leaving me to cough unpleasant surprise in response.

"Well you should be. For it won't just be you who suffers should I die."

His words chill me to the bone, for I know he is right It's not just me, and not just him at stake now, but the hold full of terrified women. He sees my reaction, Killian nodding to himself as though satisfied with my fright.

"Women on board a pirate's ship brings nothing but trouble."

"Is that why you were going to leave them to die?" I inquire, meeting his gaze head on. "Because they are more trouble than you think it worth?"

"Would you think me cruel if I said yes?" KIllian asks in return. "Or would it give you comfort to think I was trying to spare them a fate worst then death?"

"And yet you managed to do just that!" I quickly point out.

"At great cost to me..." He mutters, abruptly hissing as I press a cloth that is soaked in antibacterial fluid to his shoulder. It is there that the worst of his fresh wounds lay, open and gaping, with dried blood scabbing at the edges.

"I'm not sorry for that." I don't leave him time to interpret my words. "They don't deserve to die any more than they deserve the fun your crew wants to have."

"Oh aye, I can agree with that. With both those points. But it doesn't mean life is EVER fair."

"I never said it was." And my gaze runs sad with the memory of my mother, and fresher yet, the memory of the kind boy Killian had once been. "So now what?" I ask, trying to shake free of the sorrows both cause me.

"Now?" His brows draw together with his thoughts. He's quiet long enough that I think the silence means Killian is choosing to ignore my question. I frown and take a perverse pleasure in pressing more of the cleansing medicine against his shoulder's wound.

"They do present a problem, don't they..."

"How so?"

"I don't traffic in people." He explains. "And even if I did, these women would be the one group I cannot sell." His arm raises, Killian's fingers hovering as though the man meant to touch me. "And do you know why?"

Mutely I shake my head no, and startle when his hand cups my cheek. With that touch he draws me in even closer, and then whispers huskily in my ear. "Because they are witnesses against what your father needs to believe, that of the death of his only daughter."

"I don't matter to him." I say in a resigned tone. "Alive or dead, it won't make much difference to him."

"Oh, I know that it won't be fatherly love that drives him to come after you, but a King's pride." Killian retorted. "I've disrupted his attempt at alliance, ruined yet another bid of his to power grab."

"You've also all but guaranteed Avonlea fights a war it cannot win." I point out.

"It was not I who guaranteed it, but your father!" With that retort, his touch is abruptly gone from me. I take a step back, and then another, glaring at the pirate while fighting not to press my hand to where his had just been.

"My father wants to STOP that war!" I protest. "With the very alliance my marriage was to make!"

"So innocent, so naive...so...IGNORANT." He mocks me. "But I suppose it can't be helped. He did send you away after all."

"I may not know all of my father's dealings..."

"It's rapidly become apparent that you know NONE of them." He corrected none too gently. "Your hands are clean princess. Be grateful for that much at least."

"Grateful?!" I squeak in disbelief.

He nods, a grim look in his eyes. "If I had reason to suspect otherwise, if I thought that in any way you were at all like him, or at all privy to his true evil..."

The threat went unvoiced, but I was chilled none the less. "My father's true evil? Don't be absurd!" I tried to sound indignant, as if I wasn't concerned with anything else the pirate had just said and implied. "He may not be the most loving of men but..."

"There's no love in his heart for anyone or anything, save for his wealth and his power." He said it with such finality, with such a self reassured certainty that I knew then there was no denying it, or changing Killian's mind where my father was concerned.

"So then what?" I asked, more than a tad bitterly. "You'll play judge, juror, and executioner for these imagined crimes of his? You? Whose hands are FILTHY and only grow more so with your every act against him?" I'm actually scoffing now, haughty and proud as I stare down at this man, this pirate who murders so casually, who will be the ruin of my kingdom.

"Oh aye, my hands are dirty." He's nodding, and hardly seems insulted by what I have said. "Made that way through choice and circumstance. But it's a sad and hard fact, that to stop a monster, you have to BECOME one."

"Why?" It's nothing more than a whisper in which I speak now. "What could he have possibly done to set you on this course? What reason, what justification do you have!?" He held my gaze for too long, leaving me to become even more agitated. "Tell me!" I all but shrieked, my body vibrating with nervous energy as I remained rooted in spot some feet away from him. "I deserve to know that much at least!"

His storm colored gazed darkened immeasurably, Killian giving the bare hint of a nod. I all but held my breath, waiting on a second that seemed frozen in time. He never took his eyes from mine, watching me for every flinch and every shocked reaction, as he hissed out his answer.

"Your father is the reason, the catalyst that led me to KILL my only brother."

My breathing immediately became ragged, the harsh sound of my panicked grasp for enough air filling the room with its noise. My surroundings actually swam, my body swaying unsteadily on it's feet. Only the fear of him, of what Killian might do to me, kept me barely from fainting.

"No." I am barely consciously of what I am saying. "NO!" I scream it then, watching as Killian's eyebrow lifts in mocking condescension. I find myself shaking my head too fast, the room spinning wildly in place as I half stumble even farther away. But there's no where to run, and certainly no where to hide, my back pressing into the wall as I stare at the pirate, the mad man who has me at his mercy.

To Be Continued...

Okay I like this chapter a lot more than four. Even though it kinda rambled, and I didn't get to put everything in (yet!) of what I had hoped for in five. I hope those of you reading it like it too. And thanks go to several people who helped make me feel somewhat better about chapter four. I still kinda hate it a lot, but I don't feel so down in the dumps upset about it.

Actually I am worried now that I didn't get to cover everything I wanted. But I am grabbing the ending I got to...cause for a while there it was shaping into the chapter that did NOT want to end. It was also delayed a little, cause I was sure I was gonna write it as Belle POV but then I got conflicted and thought maybe it should be Killian's POV...I was torn cause there is stuff I want to show in both character's heads. But ultimately the Belle POV won out for chapter five! I am thinking six will be told through Killian's thoughts and feelings, but that's not set in absolute stone.

Whatever the case, I am very glad to have another chapter finished! Yay! Now to try and proofread before I have to rush out for an appointment! Actually I don't have time to proofread, just spellcheck...so i will post anyway, then update with the proofread version when I get back home...

-Michelle

XeliteWolfX, thank you! You were one of the first people to help soothe me about chapter four. So extra thanks are dedicated your way. The feedback is really apprecaiated! :) AH...what happened with the crew is one of the things I had hoped to write about more in five, but damn it, an opportunity never presented itself. Maybe in six Killian can explain what exactly happened with the crew to Belle. *knock on wood for that*

Guest, thank you! I swear if I could write as fast as I used to...but real life is always getting in my way. X_X More often than not, it feels like I think about writing more than I actually get to sit down and do it. But I am glad you like and are excited for more of this story!

Guest, thank you. :) Yes, those horny pirates are always so much trouble for Killian! Though this time around he has on his crew, more people he can trust to have his back then just poor old Smee. So yay for that! I wish wish Hook Belle was cannon...I am so upset and scared for Belle after Sunday's episode and the preview for the next episode in two weeks. Hope we get some more Hook Belle interactions in the show, regardless!

Sunnybird, thank you. I am happy to hear that you like it!


	6. Chapter 6

There is something so immensely satisfying in witnessing her reaction. In watching that mask of hers crumble apart, the princess stripped free of all her bravery and determination and hope. The vulnerability that is left, the fright and the despair, twist a mocking smile from my lips. It almost takes the sting out of the bitter truth that I have spoken, almost makes it hurt LESS, that powerful statement echoing with a steely finality inside of my own head.

 _~Your father is the reason, the catalyst that led me to KILL my only brother.~_

With those words I condemn us both, the mad guilt that pounds it's beat inside of me offset only by my burning need for revenge. They wage war and battle inside me, fight for supremacy over my thoughts. The push and pull play of them, bring with them memories. Of eyes so similar to mine, that sparkle of mischievous warmth abruptly turning shocked, blood coughed up everywhere, on the floor, on the wall, even on me. My hands colored red with it, it's a stain I will never be rid of. I'm made filthy with it, the taint of my sin a corrupting influence that doesn't just ruin, it destroys completely the man I had once been. He's nothing more than a rapidly fading memory, a hollow echo inside of my head.

He's all but drowned out by the princess, by the low voiced moan she lets out. There's nothing sexual meant by that sound, and yet I react, my fingers curling on the arm rests of the chair. With that soft, tortured protest, with the harsh rasp of her panting breath, she makes it so easy to pretend. To make believe that she's beneath me, writhing in sexual agony, my mouth, my fingers, my dick, coaxing those sounds from that trembling frame.

I actually consider it, actively imagine fitting myself between those cream colored thighs. It makes my own breath quicken, the imagined feel of how much sweeter a victory this could actually be heightening the wild excitement that is inside me. It makes my blood sing with demand, makes the need thrum a heart beat through me. I'm nearly sick with it, with this need, with this ravenous desire. It rips to shred all my caution and good sense, nearly dismantles apart what little control I have left. I stare at her, and it's not just the princess who is trembling, but the man, this filthy pirate unraveling apart with his lust.

This was never part of the plan. I never anticipated wanting her even half as much as I actually do. That lust leaves me unsettled, SHE leaves me unsettled, the princess like nothing I could have imagined. It's not just that she is beautiful of face, that her body is that luscious kind of sublime. It's that glimpse of her heart, that kind and giving nature, that self sacrificing readiness, that is like nothing at all like HIM. His blood might flow through her veins, but somehow Maurice's poison has not touched her mind or her heart. It's nothing short of a miracle, and it won't do a thing to save her, this lust of mine not caring, wanting the princess BECAUSE of her untainted soul's purity.

That heady taste of innocence combined with the wild appeal of her body and that near perfect beauty make for a damn near irresistible mix. She's a siren call that I am near helpless to deny, the princess such a tempting morsel that it is fast becoming apparent that it's no longer a matter of IF but of WHEN. I am almost calm as I realize and accept this, that wild lust inside me somewhat appeased by that unspoken promise.

Through a hooded gaze, I then take the time to study my quarry. She's plastered herself against the far wall, the uncertain rasping of her breath making her chest heave noticeably beneath the dark fabric of my shirt. That black cloth makes for a striking contrast against her too pale skin, the princess having gone as white as a sheet with the horror my words have made her feel. Her beautiful blue eyes ever so expressive, gleam wet with the sheen of her tears. They haven't yet fallen, Belle somehow in that much control of herself to not outright cry.

"How could you?" She finally asks in a broken tone of voice.

"Hmmm?" It's a distracted tone in which I murmur, my eyes never leaving hers as I start to rise up and stand. I watch as in reaction to that movement of mine, Belle presses herself more firmly against the wall. I can't help but grin at that, advancing towards her with predatory ease. Every step forward tears another exaggerated breath from her, the princess looking very much like she is about to bolt in her panic.

"How could I what?" I ask her. "Kill him? Or do you wonder more how I could have been fool enough to let your father lead me down that dark a path?" I am reaching for her then, hands intent on cupping the soft cheeks of her face. She tilts her head up at my urging, lets me bring my mouth oh so close to hers, before she stops the kiss and me in my tracks.

"How could you have changed so much? How could the boy that you were, become this...this..." She falters, as though Belle can not bear to finish the thought she is trying to give voice to. No matter, I do it for her, watching as with my words, I put the nails in the coffin of the boy she had once believed in.

"This cruel a monster?" I breathe into her, almost growling. "You have your father to thank for that. Not all monsters are born…..some are MADE."

She blinks in slow repetition, a single tear slipping free to ease down her cheek. I trace it's path with my tongue, drinking in the taste of a heart breaking. Her fingers wrap around my strong wrists, the princess shuddering in response to my tongue's play on her wet skin.

"Made HOW?" She dares to ask. "What could he have done….what could my father have possibly done to make you think he's at all responsible for the...the man you've become. The pirate..."

"I don't think, I know!" My voice snaps out then, angry with a hard, unforgiving edge. "Tell me Princess, what do you know of the Jewel of the Realm's final official voyage?"

"Not much really. Just that it was lost at sea…." She chokes on the words then. "Clearly not so much lost as STOLEN."

"Stolen? Yes I suppose one could consider it that."

"What do you consider it then?" Belle demanded.

"Just one small part of the compensation OWED me." I tell her. "There's a debt that needs to be repaid, something your father owes both myself and my dead brother, Liam…."

"Owed?" She is in total disbelief. "And what of Avonlea? What is owed our people, the men and women you endanger by disrupting the alliance my father sought to make with my marriage? You think whatever you are owed, is worth the war you plunge a country into?!"

"Avonlea and it's people are but an unfortunate and necessary sacrifice."

"Necessary?!" She tries to shake free of me then with a gasp. "Why should Avonlea pay for something that YOU did."

"Why should it not? So long as those fools continue to believe in and be led by Maurice?! A man, no, a MONSTER who was all too willing to genocide whole kingdoms to further his own ambitions."

"Genocide?!" She gasps anew. "What are you even talking about?! My father is many things, but he's never sought to whole sale kill an entire nation's people!" 

"How little you know of the true man Maurice is!" I sink fingers into her hair, the princess' struggling form going still as I tap another finger between her breasts. "How little you know of any of us." I mutter it darkly. "But it's high time you learn."

Such words, both a promise and a threat, send a shudder rolling through her. My smile then is a ruthless twist of my lips, the feeling in that expression completely warped by the malice in my eyes. I'm sure I make for one sinister figure, looming over her, fingers almost cruel as I grip the princess by the back of her hair. My other hand bunches it's fingers on the front of her borrowed shirt, my arm tensing with the effort it takes to tear the cloth open.

Her shocked gasp is the sound that accompanies the rending of that fabric, buttons plip plopping to the ground. The torn shirt makes for an attractive frame around the body that I have exposed, her large breasts heaving with Belle's scandalized breath. It's downright hypnotic, the inhale and exhaling that she does, my eyes riveted on the quivering motion of her chest. I find myself wetting my lips in hungry anticipation

She sees the lust lying open in my expression, the princess trying to twist free despite my hand's grip on her hair. An already unraveling updo, falls apart completely, waves of a luxurious chestnut brown falling down past her shoulders. The wild tangle of her hair only adds to her sensual appeal, the princess like some untamed spirit brought to life before me. I go to master her in the way I know best, crushing our mouths together in a brutal display of mad passion. The fact that she knows not what to do is immediately apparent in the clumsy way that she responds, her innocent gasp leaving her mouth ripe for the plundering.

Belle makes a sound, a high keening protest at the feel of my tongue against hers. Her every innocent falter, and scandalized rebuttal only serve as a reminder of her untouched nature. There's something immensely satisfying to know that I am Belle's first, a fact I take a twisted pride in. That pride and knowledge make me ravenous, my mouth conveying an urgency that the princess is ill at ease to accept. I don't just kiss, I devour, stealing all thought and breath from her, until Belle is half swooning against me.

Listening to the sound of her panting, I grin, enjoying the way that she leans into me for support. She's so focused on breathing, that Belle almost doesn't react when I sweep her legs free of the floor. There's a startled squeak of protest, an uncertain moment where she wants to struggle. Self preservation wins out, the princess having no desire to be dropped from this height to the floor.

"Killian..." Whatever she is intent on saying, is lost to my mouth, that hungry desire to possess her so thoroughly leaves no room for anything else. I don't want her questions, don't want to hear her verbalize neither her pleas nor her protests. I just want her, my own lips a hot demand on hers, not so much kissing as devouring her as I stumble and stagger a haphazardness path to my bed. My hip bumps against a chair, another trip causes something to fall to the floor. I don't break the kiss to see just what, unable to get enough of the princess now that I have given myself permission to just take.

It's a complete undoing of what little inhibitions I have left, my feet impatient as I hurry the last steps to the bed. I get a knee up on it's mattress, and shift the princess out of my arms enough to place her on the soft surface. I can barely stop kissing her, can barely pause long enough to tear off the remains of the shirt I have ripped. When I do, I stare at her, the princess clad in just panties and stockings, her worked over lips plump and pouty from my samplings.

With my hand on her cheek, my thumb extends to trace the softness of her bottom lip. There's a potency to be had there, the taste of her mouth a wildly intoxicating flavor, I feel drunk off it, off her, almost laughing, stealing a quick sip by brushing my lips together with hers once more. My hands lay claim to her flesh, hearing the startled squeak she lets loose with, Belle trying to twist away from the bold touches that caress sensation all over her body. I've no patience for her attempts to escape, half hearted or otherwise, my hands turning rough on her body, as I push her down and pin her against the mattress.

Even as she panics, even as she cries out a no, I've put my lips to her ear. It's a husky whisper my mouth gives voice to, a rasping reminder of what she has promised. Obedience, the woman going limp beneath me, but not before she nods her head in defeat. Pleased, I lick at her ear, my hands resuming their roaming touches. Through them I learn every inch of her body, from the fat globes of her breasts, to the curve of her hips, to the softness of her thighs. Through it all she trembles, unable to stop her tortured moans and pleading whimpers.

My teeth scrape at a tender spot, the skin there in the crook of her shoulder. The sensitive tips of her breast grow taut and tight under the play of my fingers' pinches. Her belly quivers with every intake of breath, my hand circling over it, lower and lower, and abruptly her legs snap closed together.

"Ah princess..." I half sigh in disappointment, my fingers inching under the fabric of her panties. "Have we reached the extent of your obedience?" I shift in place besides her, sift my fingers through the thatch of silken curls that cover and guard her most private of flesh. My other hand is still busy on her breast, fondling and massaging the skin there, working it over so that the tingling in her nipples never have time to stop.

"And after all I've done for you..." I continue, lowering my mouth to her other breast. The stiff flesh of her nipple contrasts nicely against the softness of my lips, the princess unable to stop the moan, as the wet warmth of my mouth envelopes her.

Through a voice that is distorted by my mouth's actions, she speaks. "All you have done?! You mean the men you have killed, the lives you have endangered, the kingdom you plunge into war?!"

Irritation flows through me. Now is not the time I want to rehash this kind of argument. "I meant..." I say as her nipple slips free of my mouth with a wet pop. "The women I granted a choice to, the women I worked to secure a miracle for. It wasn't easy you know...the sacrifices I had to make, to guarantee their virtue remains unmolested."

"Sacrifices? Such as?"

"Plunder for one thing." I answer, impatient as always for her. "I had to pay each and every man a substantial share of my own personal profit. Fortunately there is always more to make, especially from your father's latest attempts at dealings…."

"Latest?" Her brow furrows with her confusion.

"Come now." I laugh then. "You don't think tonight was the first attack against him? I've been a very busy pirate, especially these last two years. Going after his every ship, every investment and every attempt at aide sent to him by friendly nations." I sneer then. "The fools. Trusting him, thinking he means them no harm. When that couldn't be farther from the truth."

"Then what is the truth?!" Belle demands. "How exactly...if my father IS as evil as you say, how exactly would he go about the genocide of whole nations? We've barely enough wealth left to outfit the army that we do have, let alone enough soldiers to take on so many enemies!"

"He doesn't need man power to do it. He just needs...Neverland."

"Neverland? Where is that?" She asks with a frown.

"Now that is the thousand piece question, isn't it?" I grin, but there is no real humor in my eyes. "But it's a secret I've quite willingly taken to my grave, and without it, your father has no real hope of reaching that God forsaken place. Or the dream shade he needs, to complete his weapon."

"Dream shade? What is THAT?"

"A terrible poison, a plant that when ingested, can kill a healthy man dead in mere seconds." My eyes darkened with the memory, Liam choking, scrabbling fingers against his throat, trying to cough up the plant. Blood came with every attempt, greenish black veins appearing on his skin, spreading rapidly through him until the poison's path had reached his heart.

"How terrible...if it is true..."

"If? IF?!" I shout at her now. "I bore witness to it with my own eyes, saw it take a healthy man, my brother, down in twenty seconds flat! He didn't stand a chance against it, nothing can...once that poison is in you..."

"Your brother Liam died from the dream shade? But I thought…." She bit at her lip, the expression in her eyes disturbed. "I thought you said he died because you killed him?"

"I DID kill him." I snarl at her then. "It's as much my fault as it is your father's, that Liam is dead. Maurice is the one who sent us on that fool mission, and Maurice is the one who might as well have fed directly the poison into my brother's system!"

I'm breathing hard with my rage, my hands no longer so artful and precise. Instead they are rough, fighting with her legs, trying to force them to open. She fights back, her legs all a tremble with the effort to keep them shut to my advance.

"Killian!" She cries out my name, reaches a hand to me, though whether it's to stop me or strike me I do not know. I'm just grabbing at it, fingers cruelly locked around her wrist, as I turn with a wordless snarl. The look in her eyes, the sad pity there is not something I ever want to see again. Nor do I want to hear the words, to hear the questions that she gives voice too.

"If you killed him..." She asks in a slow, careful manner. "Then why? Why look so sad? Why be in so much pain over it?" 

"Because..." I whisper hoarsely, almost not daring to answer. "The wrong brother died that day…." The look of pity in her eyes increases, her other hand reaching to touch my face. I grab at that hand too, push her back down and practically scream in her face.

"Don't look at me with those eyes! I don't want nor need your pity!"

"Killian..." She gasps my name, the look in her eyes not dying to her fright. That pitying and downright sympathetic gaze remains, the princess staring at me with tears brimming once more in her eyes. I can't bear the look, can't bear her thinking she knows anything about me worth feeling so strongly for.

I'm not a man to be pitied, nor am I the boy she had once briefly known. I'm nothing like that child, or that idealistic dreamer who had gone on that voyage to Neverland. The person that I was supposed to be, the good man, the kind man, died a long time ago. What Neverland didn't kill, Maurice finished off himself, the man Killian being reborn a pirate inside that shallow grave.

To Be Continued….

Okay..this was SUCH a hard chapter to write. I have been trying for the last two and a half months. I sat for like two months with just the first page completed, and every draft after kept going horribly wrong,, until this weekend, when I finally wrote something more that sorta felt like it fit.

I feel like I am gonna ramble a lot about it. Basically I think I understand what my hang up was. I was feeling pressure by certain people to go the non consensual route, when I wasn't sure I want to go that route for this story. I am still not sure, and so my indecision on whether to go that route or not really played havoc with my ability to write for this story. Personally I think the story is served better as holding some non con elements, but at worst possibly being dub con...but we shall see what ultimately happens. I also feel like there is a limited window for true non con to actually happen here, cause I feel like once they get to the cove, and she starts getting to know him better, it could totally become a consensual thing….but we shall see. I am still very much undecided on that front. I'm not against reading or writing non con, because I have written plenty for my other fandoms. But it just doesn't feel one hundred percent right for this fic. So I am sorry to disappoint those who were hoping there would be a full on forced seduction scene this chapter. Sorry…

I also wonder if I should have added a little more to the end of this chapter, but really my brain is giving up at this point, and I just want to post what I have and take a breather from this chapter. I'm also not sure who will be the POV for next chapter….I'm kinda struggling with this story, cause I have all this plans for this, but I don't want everything to happen all at once, cause it will mess up timing, relationships developing, and how things happen or if things can happen. I'm thinking specifically of a Ruby subplot that is vital to the story later on. For that matter I am wondering how to do the Ruby stuff, without actually having to do a POV chapter in her head. But maybe I will do a Ruby interlude further down the road when the time comes.

Kudos if you read all that! I'm off to spell check and what not! 

-Michelle

Once19, thanks. Yeah its' gonna be tough to get Belle to fully believe him about Maurice. That's another thing I am struggling with, to get her to that point and have it be believable. Actually I am starting to wonder if this story is too difficult for me to write correctly. Not a fun feeling.

Anyway! I am glad you liked the Belle insight for chapter five. Yeah Killian is doing bad too….he's got his reasons, though I haven't revealed them all beyond his brother dying. But I have hinted at them, what with Belle noticing he had old scars on his back, and the comments about the boy being buried/shallow grave stuff. There's still a lot to reveal...I actually think it will be revealed to the readers in a flashback or in his thoughts, before he reveals everything to Belle...I actually know how that scene is SUPPOSED to go down, when she learns everything...and how Killian reacts to her reaction, and the Ruby's misunderstanding to his reaction. But I am worrying it won't play out the way I want it too. I envision scenes all the time, but sometimes they don't get to happen because of other stuff that happens in the story. Which is a damn shame, cause this is an important scene for the fic. So I hope I can work it in right when the time for it happens! 

Jenna, thank you! Sorry I kept everyone waiting so long! Does it really feel that different though? From my other stories for these two?

Caandra, thanks! She's a prize all right! XD

Ambroise, thank you, I am trying! Slowly, but trying!

Woilada, thanks! Am trying my best! Even if I am slow…

Sheila, thank you. I intend to. I am just slow and am juggling too many fics for this pairing! Not that I mind all the ideas they inspire me with! XD


	7. Chapter 8

His breathing is labored after that scream, Killian panting as though exhausted. The steel strength in the fingers that grip a harsh hold on my wrists contest that, the pirate effortlessly holding me down. It's not just his hands that keep me in place, it's that look in his eyes, the malevolent rage that smolders and burns from deep within. It eats away at almost everything, all thought, feeling and hope.

Certainly it leaves no room for the despair I had just spied a glimpse of. The guilt and the hurt, all of this one man's pain and heartbreak exposed. There's a suffering in his soul, an endless sorrow that feeds all that anger. It's nothing like the boy I had once briefly known, the kindness and sweet reaching empathy of that child lost to the man that he's become. A murderously driven pirate that lusts so passionately, be it for my body, or for his revenge, Killian has done his blood soaked best to destroy who he had once been.

My heart aches at what has been lost, at what could have been. I look at him and see not the proud or the honorable, but instead see an animal. A vicious, wounded beast who lashes out as though caged. My eyes fill with tears, with the sadness of what has been wrought, of a past so twisted and tortured that it has left so indelible a mark. On him and on me, my soul weeping, crying out with his pain.

His eyes blaze with his fury, the blue so bright it almost seems feverish. I see a flash of white, his teeth bared in a feral snarl, Killian again shouting out at me to stop with the pity.

"Stop it." He growls, his cruel fingers squeezing down on my wrists. "I won't have you pitying me! I won't!"

It's not smart to goad him, this mood of his as unpredictable as it is dangerous. And yet I find myself shouting back, the words coming almost unbidden from my throat. "But I do! I pity the man before me, the one who has lost so much…!"

"You know nothing of just how much I have lost!" He rages at me. "You think it just my brother…!" 

"I know it's not just that!" I shout over him, my voice a wild shriek of sound. "You've lost so much more than that, you've lost who you are, who you were meant to be..."

"Meant to be?" He snorts it out in a much calmer tone. "And just who is THAT? The misguided fool who searched for Neverland? That same man who idealized a brother who was nothing more than an all too trusting tool of your father's?!"

"Is that why he died? Because he believed in my father?!"

"Yes." Killian hisses at me. "His belief was unshakable right to the very end." A twist of his lips, a horrific grimace given to me that is a mocking attempt at a smile. "Well almost. I dare say the last twenty seconds was plenty enough time for him to realize and regret his trust in such a man."

The words are terrible to hear, the implications even worse, and yet the look in his eyes, that expression of pain, doesn't seem to fit in with the image Killian tries to paint. That cold, unfeeling pirate who murders so casually, who even killed his own brother, yet whose soul screams with pain. Why does HE feel such immense guilt and horror?

"Killian.." I breathe out his name, and struggle lightly against his hold. Immediate is the reaction, the man forcibly pushing me back down against the mattress. "WHAT exactly happened?" I ask. "What led you to such a life altering decision?"

"Your father."

"Yes, you've made mention of that. But I don't understand…." The pity in my eyes pleads with him now, begging for the answers he's not yet given me. "I did not know your brother Liam well, but somehow I can't imagine him-well ANYONE, going blindly along with another's plans for genocide..."

"Not many would." Killian agrees. "It takes a special kind of evil for THAT." His expression practically dares me to argue against that, and I find myself biting back the words, the half hearted protest of my father's own innocence. "Liam could be considered many things, trusting, loyal, a bloody fool, but even he had a line he wouldn't cross. Not even for his country or his king."

"Then?" My voice prods into the silence left by the pirate.

"He didn't believe me." Killian finally whispers. That raw voiced confession lends itself to the heart break and pain of his expression. "For all my efforts, for all my struggles, he just laughed and called ME foolish…."

"Killian?"

"He believed in HIM you know." The pirate continued. "Believed in your father, in the good Maurice claimed we would be doing in finding Neverland. He really thought the dream shade was this vaunted miracle drug that would heal all the ills of the kingdom. The sickness it would cure, the profit it would bring in as the kingdom marketed the plant to the neighboring nations...Maurice said we would usher in a golden age of prosperity and peace for Avonlea…."

"But that never came to pass. That never was HIS intention." Killian was suddenly scowling, his eyes glowering down at me. "He knew it for the poison it was. Maurice sent us not to find medicine, but a plant that could be forged into a new weapon..."

I felt the shudder go through me. "How could he possibly know that? How could YOU?"

"He knew." Killian insisted. "Certainly he knew enough to send us on that fool's errand. With little more than his words, and a few undeciphered texts to guide us on our way, he sent us off to find Neverland. That accursed place…" He shook himself free of the thought, as though he didn't want to be distracted by it. "Back then I was more scholar than sailor you see…."

"Then your role on the mission must have been… 

"To decipher the texts enough for us to find the lost land of Never." Killian nodded. "Which I did." The look in his eyes spoke of how much the thought pained him. "Once I ascertained the way to Neverland, there wasn't much to do on the voyage there. I occupied my time, working on deciphering the rest of the texts."

"It was there that you learned of the poisonous properties of the dream shade.." I hazarded a guess. "But then why...how…?"

"Did Liam come to ingest it?" Killian asked, then snapped. "Because he didn't believe! He put his faith in your father's words over his own brother's, and THAT is why he is dead!"

With those words he presses more fully on me, fitting his body on top of mine. I feel every hard inch of him, every firm line and solid piece of muscle. More than that, I feel the unique to me sensation of the bare skin of his chest pressed against mine. My breasts heave against him with my panicked breath, the tips of my nipples teased by the feel of his coarse chest hair. I shiver and shake in reaction, feel a tear burn it's way down my cheek. I'm terrified, and I am heart broken, and no closer to truly understanding. There's just too many questions, too many uncertain what ifs ringing in my head.

Torn ragged by my fear, and by the unknown, my voice lacks strength to it as I speak. "Is that why you fed him the poison then? To punish him for believing my father over you?!" 

"Oh no." He breathes with eyes that have narrowed. "Liam took the poison of his own free will. He chose to, you see...to prove me wrong!"

My sharp gasp at that makes the pirate nods his head in a grim parody of satisfaction.

"THAT is how strong a belief your father inspired in him." Killian mercilessly continues. "And that is why Maurice MUST be punished. For Liam and the hundreds like him that would be led astray by your father's evil!"

I'm shaking my head in denial. "You're wrong! My father, he couldn't have known! He sent you to find that plant yes, but you said it yourself, the texts had not yet been deciphered. Not until by you!"

His eyes flash then dull with a momentary confusion that Killian then shrugs off. "He knew." He insists. "He knew, and he was willing to torture, to kill, to get it!"

"Torture? Kill?" I cry out, trying to twist out from beneath him. He has to let go of my hands to grab hold of my waist, and his fingers dig their nails sharply into my soft flesh. "Who did he torture? Who did he kill?!"

"Me."

"You?!" I go still with my gasp, with the memory of seeing the pirate's back. Of the old scars there amidst the fresher wounds of this night's battle. "Killian…."

"He did more than just torture me." The pirate confides. "For not giving him the dream shade, for not giving up the way to Neverland, he ordered me dead."

"Dead?!"

"Beaten and bloody, and with little life left to me, the secret of Neverland died with me that day." He continued, a dreamy distant look in his eyes. His hands began to wander, to caress almost absently about my flesh. I shivered and shied away from the touch, but there was no recoiling away from the words he was saying, the truth as Killian saw it.

"It died and I died..." I shivered at those words, and at the persistent touch of his hands. They felt up my body, curved over my chest and cupped hold of my breasts. With those determined fingers, he kneaded my flesh, worked the skin over with a skillful expertise. With the very hands that had killed so casually, he then forced a reaction out of me, a low, downright pitiful cry erupting from my throat. That sound of mine drew him back to the here and now, the look in his eyes refocusing on me.

"From that day forward..." He said with a very deliberate press and rub of his thumbs against my nipples. The flesh there already so swollen and stiff, tingled further with the added stimulus. "There was nothing else for me. Nothing that is, save for seeing justice served."

"Justice?!" I squeaked out in disbelief. The look in his eyes practically dared me to argue, the man settling comfortably in place a top my body. His hands never stopped their play, his fingers plucking and teasing at my taut flesh. I shifted beneath him, trembling as though cold. That chill was at war with the heat blooming on my flesh, the blush upon me and spreading through my body.

That fierce conflict of cold and warmth only worsened with the kisses he pressed into my skin. With every greedy touch of his lips, with every open mouth kiss across my flesh, I shook, goose bumps rippling across my skin in response. "How is this justice?!" My voice is nothing more than a breathy whisper as Killian rubbed his bristly cheek against the side of my breast. "How is ANY of it? The causal killings, the needless war you plunge us into…?"

I put out my hands, touched them against his broad shoulders. I had nary a true hope of shoving him away from me, but at the very least I could command his attention with something other than my body's debauched state. "Answer me, damn you!"

"It's what he is owed." Killian sighed against my skin. The pluck and play of his fingers slowed with that sound, the pirate again wearing that dreamy, distant look. "It's what Liam..."

"Is this really want Liam would have wanted?!" My voice is a sharp interruption to the pirate's soft murmurings. "Would he really have set you on a course of vengeance against the very kingdom he was so loyal to? Would he really heap wreck and ruin upon countless innocent lives, on the many people who knew nothing of Neverland, who knew nothing of…."

"My brother is dead!" He reminded me with a sharp growl. "Dead, do you understand?!" His fingers curled on my skin, a harsh squeeze of his hands hurting me now. "I was the one left to carry on for the both of us…! When Liam would have been the better choice!"

"Stop it, you're HURTING me." I whimpered to no avail, Killian seeming past the point of hearing me. His expression was fierce, his blue eyes striking with their menace, the pirate scowling at me.

"The wrong brother died that day..." He continued, practically spitting out the words. "if he hadn't, if I had died in his place as I was SUPPOSED to….!"

"Supposed to?!" I gasped out, my eyes widening in shock as I tried to fathom what THAT was meant to mean.

"If it had been me…..if Liam had been the one to carry on..." He shook his head, as though trying to break free of whatever vicious cycle his thoughts had locked in on. "Liam was always the hero, NOT me! He would have known what to do! Instead it's been left up to me...ME! A miserable pirate who didn't know enough to stay dead!"

That devastating pain was back in his expression, the sorrow and agony that hinted at so much but told me so little. Just like he did, Killian speaking the words with vague allusions and rampant inconsistencies, leaving me in doubt of just what had truly happened. It wasn't just my father's supposed evil I was in doubt of, it was the mystery surrounding the circumstances of Liam's death. The cold blooded murder as Killian tried to make me believe it to be.

It was impossible to piece together, impossible with the rambling bits and pieces that I did know. And yet I couldn't deny his pain, the hurt that Killian was feeling. The guilt. It tore him up from the inside out, drove him on this madman's quest for vengeance that would ruin and damn an entire kingdom's worth of people. For that alone I could not excuse him, but neither could I turn a blind eye to his suffering. Not even as he abused me, my hands reaching to cup hold of his face. I felt the bristly stubble against the palms of my hands, felt the great shudder go through him at my touch.

"I…." My voice locked up as I struggled to find the right words. But I couldn't think in the moment, couldn't fathom the words needed to soothe the degree of pain that he was in. There was no magical phrase that could set things right for him, that could do away with the pain that Killian felt, and the misery he in turn inflicted on so many others. Men were dead by his vicious hand, war threatened our kingdom, and yet I in turn felt sorry for him. So sorry, for what he was and what had been lost, the brief memory of the child Killian had once been dancing through my thoughts as I let out a deep, mournful sounding sigh.

The breath I expelled was caught by him, Killian abruptly pressing his mouth to mine in the advent of that sound. His kiss was gentled somewhat, but no less fierce was the passion that he displayed, the man groaning from deep within his throat. That sound reverberated through to me, a chill going through my body with the realization that the time for talk was truly passed. Every kiss seemed to confirm it, the pirate not giving me a chance to breathe let alone speak. It left me dizzy, gasping against him for air.

It was an advantage that he took, the startling feel of his tongue moving against mine as unwelcome as his hands' movements about my lower body. Determined fingers dance across the silk fabric of my panties, the touch as tantalizing as it was frightening. I shied away but there was no stopping those fingers, wedged as firmly against me as they were. With a slight crook of them, Killian began to rub against my most private of flesh. I tried to hold fast against it, against him, my thighs trembling with the effort that it took.

Try as I might to fight my body's reaction, I found I could not entirely fight HIM. Not with my response, and not with my actions, my hands falling away to lay limply on the mattress. I all but offered myself up as a sacrifice, my body his for the taking. For the supposed sins of my father, for the brother Killian had lost, and for the women in the hold, I gave myself up to the pirate's dark desires.

To Be Continued…

Eh...I may come back and add more to the ending of this chapter. It was so hard to write, and my brain is kinda short circuiting at this point. I am of torn feelings on this chapter, and was trying to keep some of what he is telling her vague, as if she learns everything at once, it messes up a future moment. But it feels like it is warping out of my control, out of what I had originally planned in terms of her learning and when/if she comes to believe him. Suffice it to say, I didn't expect her to hear the whole story (And she sorta hasn't..) this early on! Face palms at self.

Also still totally undecided and angsting over whether full non con will happen or not. Just letting the characters take me where they will at this point. Though I am kind of kicking and screaming in protest for some of it. Just cause it feels like they are trying to derail the whole story! _

Edited to add, a day later, added a little over a thousand more words to the chapter! Yes! But I feel like such a flip flopper, cause it looks like non con will happen after all, unless the characters surprise me again. glares at them for taking over and dictating the story. I'm already scrambling to make the adjustments for later on in the story….hoo boy has this derailed me….I'm pretty sure next chapter will be Killian's narrative…

Laters!

-Michelle

Guest, thanks! Me too!

Jewelzy, aw thanks! Glad to be writing again! :D


	8. Chapter 8 Eight

Author's Note: In case you might have somehow missed it, I went and updated chapter seven with more content. Over one thousand new words. So please read it before you start in on eight! Heck, review it too please! None too subtle hint hint!

-Michelle

She's such an intoxicating brand of innocence, the kind of sweetness and light that could warm a man's soul. Certainly Belle ignites a fire inside me, this desire blazing through me, burning away so much in the moment. My past, my misdeeds, maybe even my pain, all pushed aside, all but forgotten in this one moment as I lose myself to the touch and taste of her.

The succulent sweetness of her mouth, the soft silk that is her skin, I learn it and I learn it well, stealing the very breath from her. Belle's chest heaves with her erratic attempts for air, the princess pushing feebly at my shoulders. She has no chance of dislodging me from her, the dig of her nails into my skin a pleasant spike of pain that makes me feel even more alive. Certainly she brings to life a wildness inside me, a mad passion that had never been planned for. Made crazed by it, by her, what little thoughts I have left are an insane frenzy of primal want and need. There's no room for my revenge, no room for her father, or memories of Liam and what could have been. There's only HER, that sublime beauty with those generous curves, Belle's sweetly voluptuous body just as sensitive as it is maddening.

I feel it in her every gasp, in her every suppressed whimper and plea. Her wordless protest, the small moans she lets out, those helpless sighs all work together to spark further reaction in me. My dick already so engorged with blood actually twitches in anticipation, alive to the reluctant beat of Belle's voice. With that song in my head, with the need thrumming through me, it's all I can do not to completely unravel apart and just take her.

The beast that I am is not so big a brute as that. Cruel though I may be, I don't want to actually hurt her. Is it some remnant of the boy I once was, that kind soul who wouldn't have wanted to harm a fly? Or that of the honorable scholar, the good man who would have never dreamed of forcing himself on someone. Or is it just that even as a revenge minded pirate, I still had some small love and respect for women? Whatever the answer might actually be, the truth of it was that the princess was a virgin. That same innocence that drove me wild also gave me pause, my hands traversing the plains and contours of her body, to caress my fingers over the silk fabric of her panties.

Over that smooth cloth did I play, my hand shifting lower, until I was brushing fingers against her covered sex. Her gasp was immediate, and swallowed up by my lips. Even less successful was her attempts to shy away from such a touch, the princess caught between my body and the bed's mattress. She was trapped, and we both knew it, my fingers as ruthless as my mouth. I crooked and curled my fingers against her, rubbed the lightest of friction upon her. Belle's thighs trembled in response, the princess struggling to resist me.

Struggling and failing, her hands no longer quite so fierce in attempting to push me away, her moaning protests become less and less about no. She was slowly capitulating, her trembling body becoming more and more pliant beneath me. By the time that her hands fell away from my shoulders in surrender, I was tearing away at the fabric of her panties, all of Belle's attempts at defiance utterly defeated. Panting, she lays there, naked save for the white stockings that cover her legs. I touch one now, feel the heat of her skin faintly through that sheer material. There's a thread of ribbon just at the edge of her thigh, a bright burst of blue color amidst all that whiteness that matches well with Belle's eyes.

I pretend not to notice the wet sheen of them, Belle's gaze misted over with tears. Even in heart break she is exquisite, that perfect beauty oh so capable still of stealing my breath, my thought, my very reason from me. It's all I can do to remember not to fall on her like some wild animal, the savage impulse of the desire she arouses within my body urging me to just take, to outright claim the prize presented before me. It's that lust that I fight against, it and that needy impatience that would make me clumsy in my handling of her. It's a struggle for control, a battle against myself that only grows worse the longer and more often I lay my hands on the princess. Sweet tempting morsel that she is, the whispered rumors of her lush appeal could never have prepared me for the reality.

I had known she would be beautiful, Belle a heart wrenching kind of pretty even as a child of around eight. The years had only been kind to her, the woman a heady mix of sublime loveliness and ripe, juicy form, the kind of body that would drive ANY man wild. Even me. Caught in the spell of it, the few good morals that I cling to, don't just push away, they shatter. I forget completely that I've never been the type of man to force himself so completely on a woman, and that the princess is not completely willing. I forget the prisoners in the hold, the women Belle has bartered both her obedience and her body for. I forget MYSELF, my hands working to spread and splay more fully her thighs.

She's beautiful even there, the slight tremor of my hand betraying the excitement vibrating inside me. I touch those trembling fingers to her directly, stroke two up and down the length of her slowly. She stirs from whatever stupor her surrender had cast her in, Belle lifting up off her back. The protesting noise from her throat, draws my gaze to lock eyes with her. I'm very deliberate as I touch her, stroking again and again, learning the velvet texture feel of her furled flesh. There's a bright blotch of color on her cheeks, the princess seeming ashamed by what I am making her feel.

The fine tremor that runs through her body, only grows stronger, the princess shaking with the effort to hold still. Belle actually bites down on her bottom lip, as though that sharp bit of pain will distract from the sensations I am stimulating to life inside her. With those sensations comes the reluctant arousal, my fingers succeeding in coaxing out her body's wet response.

The proof of it on my fingers, her body's damp state makes my chest swell with pride. For it's my touch that's done this, that's forced this reaction out of her. I smile with self satisfaction, make her flushed face the focus of my gaze. She looks so needy, so lost, Belle's lips pressed tightly together to deny me her moans. That won't do, I set about to schooling her, to teach her the harsh lesson that there is little she can actually keep from me. Not her sounds, not even her body and it's response, the circling caressing motion of my thumb pressing down on that bundle of nerves that is her clitoris. She jerks against me in response, her mouth a perfect o of surprise. I can't stop the laughter, teasing her with my words as well as with my fingers.

"Have you never touched yourself, princess?" I ask her, not bothering to hide my amusement. Impossibly pink, she shakes in denial, her eyes squeezed shut against the sight of me. Of my smile, that smirking twist of my lips, and all that it implies.

"Oh, the fun that we shall have."

Her eyes snap open at that, the blue narrowed into a fierce glare. "I believe you mean the fun that YOU will have."

I don't let my expression sour, not even at the reminder of Belle's unwillingness that those words of hers are. Instead I shift an arm around her, hauling her flustered form against mine. I kneel in the spread of her legs, hold her upright with my arm, while my hand maintains it's busy play between her thighs. It's a relentless touch on her clit, an insistent pinch of my thumb and forefinger working over that flesh. She tries and fails to suppress the fitful sound that escapes her, the woman slumping against me in an attempt to bury her face against my shoulder.

I find myself rubbing my face into her hair, listening to the muffled sounds of her discontent. I don't stop, I can't, working her clit over in a calculated design, intent on not just her submission, but Belle and her body's total surrender. She fights this, fights me, biting down on my shoulder, curling her nails into the bared skin of my arms. But by leaps and bounds she loses, the tremor of her body turning into a full on shake, Belle writhing in place against me, wriggling about in an effort to ride my hand. The princess cries out as she does this, a frustrated sound of defeat.

My teeth bared in a triumphant grin, I don't stop my teasing of her. Not even as she grows slick with arousal, her nails on my skin drawing blood. It's a total loss of control I go for, Belle's hips going wild with her erratic movements. With a garbled cry, the princess comes apart for my fingers, shaking and writhing in place for every second of the climax I've wrung out of her.

It comes not a moment too soon, my own body's demands no longer able to be put off. The pained ache of my cock leaves me both impatient and eager, as I ease the princess back down onto the bed's mattress and it's pillows. Her arms stay locked around me, the princess hiding her face against my shoulder. I let her, too busy working the ties of my trousers open, my slick fingers clumsy with an impatient haste born of pure need.

With a groan, I freed myself, that long, thick length of mine throbbing. The princess felt it against her belly, made a weak sound of protest, but not once did she attempt to look down. She just stayed buried, as though her hiding could somehow protect her from the reality of what was about to happen. It can't, the shifting of my body bringing my dick into prime position. The fat head of my cock nestles into the folds of her flesh, Belle beginning to noticeably tense up.

With her nails digging into me, with Belle's teeth biting down, a ragged breath escaped her. I hadn't even begun to breach her body, instead just letting the stiff tip of me brush against her hot, feminine core. The degree in which her body stiffened, the resistance there would cause me to do some very real damage. It was the last thing that I wanted, even as my lust tried to override my common sense, my own body tense and straining with the effort to hold still.

"Belle…..Belle relax." I urged her to no avail. I whispered the words again, a plea that buried itself into her hair, my mouth searching, searching, and then finding her ear. With a sharp nip, I bit down on the lobe of it, distracting her at that crucial moment. She still jumped in startled reaction to the feel of me buried inside her, still wriggled in discomfort, tearing a hiss out of me as I snapped at her not to move. It was an order I'd do well to heed for myself, the glorious feel of the princess squeezing tight around me almost enough to unman me in the most spectacular of fashion.

With the princess quivering around me, I fought to master control of my own body. I would not embarrass myself by spilling so quickly, I would not! But it was a task easier said then done, my own breath coming out labored. I counted the seconds out in my head, then waited a good ten more, before I dared tried any movement. The hiss that was heard came from us both, the princess' pained protest at odds with my own satisfied sound.

"Don't move!"

I couldn't help it, I laughed, a short and strained sound. "You really DO ask for the impossible."

"Killian!" A sharp squeak from her in reaction to the bit of movement my laughter had caused me to do. I shifted on top of her, and tangled fingers in her hair. Belle kept her face hidden, buried against my shoulder when I wanted to see both the look in her eyes and the moment when this sweet, sweet agony became something that she too could enjoy.

With my fingers command of her hair, I tugged on that long length of silk, forcing her to look at me. Those expressive eyes of the princess were rimmed with the red of her misery, the tears that she tried to suppress lingering at each corner. Through the wet haze of them, she glared at me, her blue eyes flashing with her hurt. I pressed a kiss to her cheek in apology, for the hurt I had done, and for the discomfort I would cause her yet.

Something very much like resentment spiked in her eyes, when I gave a slow tentative thrust of my hips. I don't think she realize the effort that it took, my fraying control wanting and screaming at me to just pound my way on inside her. Every shift of my body was a battle, the pleasurable sensations that surrounded me demanding I give in. I could no more stop than resist, my body moving, doing a slow but insistent grinding inside her.

With every slight thrust, with every slide back, my control gave way, each forward surge of my hips harsher than the last. What started out lazily, soon became determined, a harsh pace being set. The fluid rhythm of my body's dance, the bounce back of her body across the sheets, it all began to work it's magic, the pain in Belle's eyes dulling to a grudging shock. Her lips parted on her gasp, the woman appearing dazed and confused. It wasn't quite the ecstasy that I had hoped to see, but at least it was better than the tears and accusations of her earlier glare.

With every glide together of our bodies, the princess' look become more and more lost. She stared at me as though entranced, that lost, helpless look accompanied by a moan. That tortured cry was the sweetest of sounds, Belle shaking, writhing in place against me. I growled at her movements, dug my fingers harshly into her hair, holding her still for my mad kiss.

Drunk off of the brand of delicious that was her surrender, I heard my own harsh pants, felt the groan from deep within my chest. Tension was building, was becoming worse, my hips frantic pace tearing fitful moans from the princess. Already so close, the wet heat coiling around me, only worked against me, every squeeze of that tightness sending my eyes rolling back. I couldn't resist, couldn't even make the attempt to try, heaving my hips forward as the seed erupted from me.

Belle cried out, but that repulsed sound was not the triumphant herald of my complete and total victory. Even as my thrusts slowed and were haphazard in their movements, even as I emptied out my climax inside her, I was aware of Belle. Of her own response, that light frantic breathing, the fact that she had come close but not quite made it over the edge. Wound up tight, and coiled around me, the princess still strove for her own release.

I could do no less than oblige her, my hand caressing between our bodies. She quivered all over, her skin slightly damp and hot to the touch. It was nothing compared to the heat of her insides, to the way she burned all around me. But the fiercest fire would prove her spirit, Belle crying out a no, trembling and twisting in place, in a mad effort to escape me.

For one second I thought she meant to strike me, her arm actually raising with intent. She seemed to think better of it, the princess crying out with a moan, shaking, shaking and then arching up off the bed. Her thighs closed around my hand, Belle wriggling and writhing in place with her voice broken on a soft scream.

To be Continued…

Yeah, I pretty much gave up at the end there. I tried for the better part of forty minutes to write something after the last sentence, and nothing seemed to fit what I wanted. I think at this point it might be better to move on to the next chapter, then try to force a few more paragraphs that don't want to come out. I'm very frustrated...in more ways than one. This was a hard chapter to write, and I am not completely satisfied with it.

Part of it is, Killian seemed to only be in lust mode here..when in previous chapters he had anger, sorrow, and guilt in addition to the lust. But I was also aware if he was jumping from mood to mod, he might end up in his anger hurting her really badly. So I tried to set it up in the words that I wrote, that once he focused on the lust, it pushed back all the other stuff for a time. But I am still not completely happy.

I originally thought the next chapter would also be a Killian POV, but now I am sorta thinking it will be a Belle one. Unless I come back to this chapter and manage to add something to Killian's POV.

I swear, the characters derail me so much. Someday when I have the final chapter (Which is nowhere near the final chapter. We're not even at the halfway point folks!), I will write an author's note talking about what my original plans for the overall story had been, and how Killian and Belle messed them up on me. But I think the changes I ended up having to make, will make the story a better one. But I suppose time will tell. The non con was a derailment, but also last chapter, with how much Killian told her, even if Belle was only confused and feeling like she was missing major pieces to the puzzle. _

Also thinking Ruby will get more than one narrative chapter in this. The first may even be soon!

And don't be shy, I would love some feedback. Am DESPERATE for it in fact. Makes with the sad eyes.

-Michelle


	9. Chapter 9

Sleep doesn't come easy. For all my exhaustion, for all my mental, physical, and emotional abuse, the fitful happenings of the past night, the very things that have led to my weary state, keep me up. When I do sleep, it is in spurts, all too brief moments of time where I dream. The nightmares that I endure, the memories, make my pulse race, my heart working frantically, the harsh beat beat beat of it sounding like a faint drum playing in my ears.

It's not the only sound, but it's the one I am most aware of. It and the light snoring that comes from behind me, that rumble of noise a constant reminder that I am not alone. That menacing presence, the new awareness that I now have of him, makes me shudder. I tremble and tense up at every shift of his body, the bare press of his flesh against mine, a sensory reminder of what he has done. I hold myself as still as I can against him, try to keep from whimpering in fear each time I think he might come awake. That he never does, is nothing short of a miracle, this time it gives me needed for my body to recover.

There's an unpleasant soreness between my thighs, the sharp ache of an untried body well used. I feel hot just remembering it, feel tears prick in my eyes at just the memory of him. That hard, solid length, the thick relentless feel of it moving inside me, his body a weapon thoroughly intent on the ravishment of mine.

I bite down on my lip, but can't stop the loud sniffle of sound from my nose. I've been trying for the better part of the night to not burst into tears, to not give in so completely to my heart break. It's not just the rape, or the revenge, it's him, everything Killian had once been, everything he now was. It tore at me, the memory of the kind boy he had once been, the pirate that he now was doing his best to put the final nails into it's coffin.

I clung to the remnants, to that one memory that had meant everything to me. To the boy I had idealized, my heart building up a fantasy of what could have been. The man that boy could have been, the love that I could have had, the future that should have been ours. In another time, in another place, if I hadn't been a princess, if he hadn't been a pirate. But he was, and my future had already been mapped out long before he had handed me that handkerchief. A princess by birth, it was my duty to wed for the good of the kingdom, my body a sacrifice meant to buy peace and prosperity for my people. Killian had STOLEN that from me, had taken the birthright that was my sworn duty. He had done more than just rape me, had brought more than just war to Avonlea. He had destroyed all chance of hope for my people.

I should hate him for that. And a part of me does. For all he has done, and for the memory he tries to kill, the fantasy I cling to still. That boy's recollection is a cold comfort at best, and yet he's all that I have left, that act of kindness having left it's impressionable mark on my young self. Sweet and soothing, it is nothing like the brand the pirate burned into my flesh the night before. The feel of him, the memory of not just his penetration inside me, but of his fingers and their relentless attack. I shiver but am so hot, remembering the things he had made me feel, the reactions he had forced out of my body. I have no name for these things, for the sensations he has caused me to experience. I didn't even understand them, and I certainly didn't like them, no matter what my physical response might have otherwise led one to believe.

I was ashamed. Hurt and betrayed by more than just Killian, my own body had turned against me, responding in so brazen, and wanton a manner. I vowed then and there to never again let it, to never again feel that wild rush of sensation. That complete loss of control, everything about me having tightened up, that tension than snapping, leaving me with that feel good sensation that had been like nothing I had ever before experienced.

I didn't know what was the cause, the reason behind it. How could his fingers have felt that good, what magic did he possess to force such a reaction out of me? And why! Why had he bothered, why had he cared? What reason could the pirate possibly have beyond my complete and utter humiliation? I just didn't understand, so little told to me of the marriage bed. So little revealed to me of what would happen between a man and his woman.

Tortured by that experience, by my near complete lack of knowledge, I endlessly fretted besides him. Killian lay pressed up against my back, an arm wrapped possessively about my waist. In the beginning I had tried to pull away, but he hadn't allowed it. Every shift of my body had the pirate hauling me back, Killian's amused chuckle in my ear. This too I didn't understand, this act of holding. He had finished with me, had taken his pleasure inside me. It should have been over, I shouldn't have been made to endure his touch long after the deed was done!

And yet here we were, hours later, the sun's dawning light creeping in through the cabin's windows, and the pirate was STILL holding onto me. It left me irritated, my heated skin burning against his, my body so unused to the sensation of naked flesh against mine. I couldn't possibly sleep like this, unable to relax, aware of him in this way. It wasn't just the naked feel of him, it was his presence, the fact that this was the first time in my adult life that I wasn't sleeping alone.

The sigh I let out was a disgruntled sound, and I again tested the strength of that arm. Tested then froze at the sound that he made. A low growl, not so much a warning as a threat, Killian sounded like some feral animal. My skin crawled, the unease practically rippling through me. His whole body had tensed up, the muscles rigid against me, Killian growling again. A name, my father's, Killian cursing his very existence, damning him with the foulest of words.

It was more than just a tirade against my father. Killian seemed caught in the throes of some nightmare, some foul memory that had him suddenly shouting out.

"I'll never give you what you want! Neverland and it's secrets die with me this day!"

That arm that had been so strong around me, abruptly fell away, the man rolling over but he didn't stay still. He moved, writhing as though in agony, a low voiced moan escaping him.

"Liam."

That sound, the heart break in it, got me to turn towards him. His was a troubled visage, Killian breathing hard, panting, his unguarded expression one of pure misery. The pain that was there, the guilt and the sorrow stirred something in me, the pity he did not want. I said his name softly, watched as a single tear slipped out from beneath his shut eye. It'd take a crueler woman than I to ignore the suffering there, my hand reaching out, touching against his shoulder with the intent to shake him awake.

That one touch, the briefest of grazes, and he was snapping awake. He didn't just open his eyes, he reacted, roughly seizing hold of me, and slamming me into place on my back. One hand gripped hold of my arm, the other actually closed around my throat, that painful squeezing hurting, leaving me to choke on my gasp. He loomed over me, looking wild, a dangerous, angry beast of a man. I stared up at him, and did not struggle, did not do anything save choke. The expression in those storm dark eyes looked confused, the pirate staring without truly seeing me.

"Killian." I tried to speak, but his choke hold made it impossible. I felt the room spin, felt myself grow weaker, tears falling from my eyes. Feebly, I reached out to him, brought the offending hand to his face. I grazed fingers against his stubble covered cheek, and then my strength left me completely, my arm thumping down on the mattress.

That one touch was enough, the pirate coming back to me. He snatched away his hand from my throat, stared at me with a shocked horror, and then abruptly had left the bed. Too weak to do anything else, I closed my eyes. When next I opened them, it was to the cool feel of cold water, the pirate holding me up to help me drink from a glass.

It hurt to swallow, but I was greedy for the cold liquid. My body already so hot, felt even worse now, made almost feverish from my scare at his hands. I drank and he watched me, my trembling hand gripping his. I locked worried eyes with him, and to my surprise, Killian actually averted his gaze.

"Wh…." I licked at my lips, heard the dry rattle that was my voice now. "What was that?!" It didn't appear as if he was going to answer, the pirate turning from me. I wouldn't let him, frowning as I reached out with my hand to touch and force his face back to mine. "Killian?"

"It...it was nothing."

"It didn't sound like nothing." I stroked his cheek in an attempt to be soothing, trying to coax the words from him. "You were speaking on my father, on Neverland."

"Oh?" His tone and expression was guarded, the man holding himself absolutely still for my touch. "And what of it?"

"You were so upset. So angry! It...it was unsettling." I admitted. "I had to wake you. If only to save you from that dream."

"It was NO dream." He told me, touching my hand. It stopped me from pulling away, my shiver of unease felt by him. "It was a memory."

"A memory." I repeated a tad dully.

"There's not a day that goes by, not an hour that passes that I don't think of him. Of all he has done, all he has cost me, and the brother that he helped kill." He held my gaze with his, and very deliberately said the following. "You are lucky that you didn't end up dead as a result."

"I know." I whisper, vividly recalling the feel of his hand closing around my throat.

"I don't think you do. I've easily killed men who were built much thicker and stronger than you. Remember THAT the next time you think to shake me awake from my memories."

"It won't happen again." I fervently promised. He nodded in seeming satisfaction, still watching me with that careful focus. It made me uncomfortable, and though his eyes stayed on mine, I felt exposed, as though he was looking over my very naked body.

"Now that THAT is settled….." The empty glass that I had been holding, thumped against the bed, Killian suddenly hauling me against him. My face heated up with color, my lips parting on a gasp as I found myself in his arms. "Why don't you tell me what exactly I said about Neverland."

"Ne...Neverland!?" I couldn't help gaping at him. "There was nothing said of any importance!"

"I will be the judge of THAT." He retorted. "I went to a lot of trouble to make sure Neverland's secrets died with me that day..." 

"Died?! DIED! Why do you keep saying that!" I interrupt with a shout, struggling against him. My breasts rubbed against his chest, the fine hair there teasing against my nipples. I then tried to twist free, to turn in such a way as to avoid that sensitive part of me rubbing against him. He hauled me back, his eyes all a glow with his glower.

"Because it's the truth!"

"The truth?" I couldn't help goading him, scoffing with my disbelief. "How can that be anything but! You are as alive as me!"

"Your father believes otherwise!"

He suddenly shoved me away so that I toppled over onto my back. I made an indignant squawk of sound, but he was already straddling my waist. One hand gripped the base board of the bed, the pirate looming over me.

"Killian?!" A thread of fear was in my voice. I was gazing up at him, remembering a similar time when he had sat upon me using his dagger to shred apart my gown. He hadn't been completely naked then, the tight fit of his pants shielding me from the worst of his anatomy. Now however, the hot heat him was on me, the part of him that had so thoroughly violated me, standing stiff and proud, and feeling even livelier than I had remembered.

My dawning awareness of the threat of him, brought a twisted smile to his face. "Shall I continue your education, princess?" 

I blinked in slow repetition, shaking my head no. I had no confusion, even if I had no real understanding, save for the certainty that his naked and aroused state meant trouble for me.

"Then tell me what I want to know." Killian touched his hands to my breasts as he said this, the pirate kneading that fat flesh with a skillful roughness. I winced and cried out, trying to pull back. The headboard behind me prevented any escape, and my movement only served to cause the glide of his manhood over my skin.

That tore a hiss from him, his blue eyes darkening immeasurably with whatever wicked thought was in his head. My mouth went dry at the sight of him, my tongue licking at my lips nervously. Those eyes seemed to glow, all malevolent with the desire that action of mine inspired in him, his smile becoming even more pronounced.

"Neverland, princess." He said as a way of reminding me, bending to touch a thumb to my bottom lip. "What do you know?"

"Nothing!" I cry out. "You told me nothing!"

"Wrong answer." Killian says it as though it was a regretful thing, sliding forward with a shift of his hips. I couldn't stop the scandalized gasp, or the advantage that he took, the fat crown of his cock pushing into my mouth. I immediately made a sound, tried to close my lips around him as though that would somehow force him out. Instead it had the opposite effect, the pirate letting out the most feral of moans.

My eyes wide, I starred up at him, my whole body a tremble. Both his hands were now on the bed's headboard, a white knuckled grip as though it was taking all his efforts to keep from moving.

"One last chance, princess."

Panicked, I screamed, frustration and fury in that sound, but also fear. He made me the focus of his gaze, held himself still for one second more, and then thrust in deeper. My sounds of protest were muffled against his thick shaft, against the hard flesh that slid over my tongue. He was big, too big, and then I remembered my hands. I curled them into fists, used them to beat at his chest. He just made a sound, some strangled groan, his hips moving in a grim parody of last night.

Tears in my eyes, I screamed again, pushing at him now with my tongue. That did nothing to aid me, Killian's hips only hesitating for one second, before he became even more insistent. I struck at him again, kicked out with my legs, but I could not dislodge him.

I was openly sobbing, crying when he pulled free of me. That part of him glistened, gleaming wet from my mouth. "Why won't you believe me?" I asked him, with a hoarse hiccup of sound.

He gazed at me, that part of his body red and twitching violently with need. I feared he was about to try for a repeat performance, my lips sealing shut to deny him the chance. He had let go of the head board, reaching instead to touch one tear slick cheek. His blue gaze was still so perverse, the man staring at me. Time once again froze, a split second of eternity stretched out for just forever. It broke on a sob, mine, his thumb trying to brush away my tears.

That gentle touch was so at odd with all he had done, with the look in his eyes, with the barely leashed sexual frustration rolling off him still in waves. I couldn't bear looking at him, couldn't bear the look gleaming in his eyes, anymore than I could stand the sight of his body so threateningly near. My lips began trembling, the sobs coming harder, his image blurring. The tears that all but blinded me, spared me the sight of him now, but not the sound of his voice, the pirate suddenly grumbling a heart felt bloody hell.

With those words between us, with his touch gone from my face, I felt the bed move, felt his weight leave me. I brought my hands up to cover my face, to openly sob into their palms.

"Belle..." The heavy emotion in that utterance, couldn't get me to stop, my shoulders shaking as I wept. I heard his frustration, felt his hands touch my torso, the man bending forward to pepper kisses into my skin as a way of apology. It confused me, HE confused me, the pirate so quick to go from one extreme to the other. From that mad lustful rage now to this regret, he changed moods like another man would change shirts, Killian clearly unstable. Did it all have to do with the loss of his brother, with the evil he claimed was in my father? Or was there something more, something else to warrant the damage done to his mind?

At the moment I thought myself too far gone to care. I was exhausted, and only made sicker by everything that had happened. That continued to happen. He kept pressing open mouthed kisses into my skin, whispering something that sounded very much like an apology. I cared for none of it, wanting to be left alone, wanting him gone from my life.

His lips continued, caressing kisses across my abdomen. The feverish warmth that had never truly left me, seemed to blaze like an inferno, and yet I was also chilled to the bone, shaking. My belly tensed under his attention, his strong, work rough hands touching on my legs, smoothing those calloused palms along my skin from hip to knee and back again.

By this time, the worst of my sobs had dulled in strength, my hands having lowered enough so that I could peek over my fingers at him. Killian was mouthing at my skin, a kiss here, a nip there, his teeth scraping gentle sensation onto my right hip. The pirate smiled as he did it, some open expression of boyhood charm. I narrowed my eyes in response, still so wary, so upset, so ANGRY with him. It didn't help my mood any, to hear him chuckle in response, his busy hands still rubbing up and down the length of my legs.

"Stop it." I finally say, trying to pull back my legs from his grasp. The glide of his palms, the caress of his fingers, it made gooseflesh break out all over my skin. The warmth from his hands couldn't chase away the chill inside me, or the unease, this devastating man whose mood ran hot and cold together, beginning to ease apart my legs.

"Don't!"

He doesn't take heed of me. For all his seeming apology and care, the truth is my wishes, my feelings don't matter to him. I glare at him now, the resentment surely alive in my eyes. The pirate just ignore it, focused instead on my body, on the prize he is intent on claiming. I fight to keep my legs closed, but he pries them part. With Killian fitting between them, fingers then pet over me. They sift and play over my curls, caress me like I am some pet in need of taming. I open my mouth, intent on giving him a stiff rebuke, but my scathing attack dies with a gasp, Killian's eyes gleaming with focused intent.

I make a sound, a rattling noise of protest. Surely he can't mean to, I think, and I prove WRONG. The pirate puts his mouth on me, licks right over the seam of my sex. It make me feel strange, the play of his tongue a lot like his fingers, but also different somehow. I sit there in a stupefied daze, not fighting, not so much as reacting, as he licks me repeatedly, the slow lazy slurp of his tongue then galvanizing me into action.

I drop my hands to his hair, curl my fingers into a digging grip, as I try to haul him away from me. I'm sitting up as I do this, hunched partially forward as I plead with him, yell at him, and ultimately cry out for him. He doesn't stop, not even to come up for air. Instead Killian hums against me, his fat tongue wriggling about, tracing the contours of my swollen flesh.

Spread open by his tongue, his mouth closes over that one spot his brand of torture favors so well. I gasp and jerk back, but his hands grab at me, making me sit still for this torment. I hear the low whine of my voice, feel the way I fight and squirm against his hold. The wriggling does little to soothe the sensation he is suckling out of me, his pursed lips and tongue working over a spot I had never known the existence of until late last night.

It's just one more way he's ruined me, the debauched state of my body bringing a fierce heat to my flesh. I then moan, writhe in fitful place as the pirate holds me against his face. My fingers are no longer pulling at his hair, my thighs no longer trying to close against this invasion. My fight has been tamed, the spirit inside me delirious, my fingers petting over and over, stroking encouragement into his scalp. From a distance, I hear my voice pleading, a single word repeated over and over again.

"Please."

I no longer know what I want more of. For this torture to stop, or for this exquisite agony to never end.

To Be Continued…

I'm smacking myself. Partly so you the readers don't have to! Ha! But partly cause...I..okay I knew there was gonna be a scene like this, but I didn't expect the smut to take up the majority of the chapter. Face palming here. Also worrying about backlash for how Killian treated her when he woke up and tried to interrogate her about Neverland. (the whole forced fellatio segment) That part was NOT part of my plans, but I swear this story is becoming I guess what you call free form? But I am trying to stick to my plot points too…

I also realized and accepted this is probably gonna be pretty smutty story. Why? Well once he forced himself on her, I don't see him as having the strength to just stop, to quit cold turkey. So our dirty, crazy pirate is gonna be pretty insatiable for this story. Face palming again.

Next chapter will probably still be a Belle POV, and I am hoping it will be without an actual smut scene. But I am not betting on it, nor am I betting against it. Again the way the characters are derailing me, I would not be surprised if they went at it again... _

But the chapter after that will be Killian, and unless it's all thoughts in his head, I know the Killian chapter wont get a sex scene. Not for 11! Though I still have to write 10 first...and make it a Belle POV probably.

This chapter really took a life on it's own. Had to stop to watch the new Once episode, but I couldn't entirely concentrate on the show, cause I was too busy worrying about what I had written. Would love for you guys and gals to weigh in on what you thought of this one. Feedback keeps me motivated! Especially when I write a chapter like this, cause I swear, when I get met with silence, I become convinced I need to trash the chapter, and rewrite it completely...I wish I didn't doubt myself so much….

Laters! 

-Michelle

Pentatoni, oh thank you! Pleased to meet you, and hear that you loved that chapter and (hopefully the story!) I will keep on trying my best. So I hope you keep enjoying it! Captain Beauty ship forever! High fives you.

Woilada, thank you! :D I will try my best!

Jenna, thank you! Though sometimes I think that intense quality gets me in trouble, at least when it comes to a non con scene. Some people can't handle intense with such a scene..and have flamed me in other fandoms. =/ But I am happy that so far, chapter eight got a positive reaction from those who reviewed it! Thanks again!

Guest, thank you!


	10. Chapter 10

There's no shame to him, not a single drop of regret. Not for the crimes that he commits, or for the sins of his very soul, Killian every inch the ruthless, uncaring pirate. Nothing matters much to him, not even the many lives he has ruined, his hands dirty, made bloody by his and his choice alone. I feel the resentment boil over in me, feel the way my eyes narrow with that glare. I stare at him and watch the unconcerned manner in which he prowls about the room half dressed, the pirate looking for all the word like a great big contented feline. The cat who has swallowed the canary whole.

I burn with my shame, with the memories that spark so vivid in my thoughts. The gleam of the moisture on his face, his lips, chin and stubble having glistened with it. The way he had licked his lips clean with great relish, his voice sounding an appreciation normally reserved for the most delicious of meals. His hair all wild and askew, made that way by my fingers own grip, their desperate dance over his scalp having pleaded encouragement to him. That unexpected, unwanted humiliation had only been the start of his cruelties, Killian bodily taking hold of me. There had been no time to recover, none allowed, Killian sinking inside me, the way eased substantially by the sopping wet mess he had made of my sex.

It made me shudder just to remember. Made me recall the powerful spasms that had twisted inside me, my body squeezing down on his shaft, coiling about in greedy supplication. My body had wanted what my heart and mind had not, desperate for the sensations, for the feel, for that scraping thrust that was both pleasure and pain. My once virginal body has been transformed, made into some brazen and shameless thing, my very nature lost to the wriggling, writhing roll of my hips.

That wasn't me, I hissed in my head. If he hadn't assaulted me, if he hadn't forced my body to feel so strongly, I would have never acted like that. So desperate and needy, my voice conveying my urgency with the wildest of sounding moans. The heat that's never left my skin, sends a hot blush through me. I don't need a mirror to know I am red faced, sitting as I do in the center of the pirate's bed. I've got a blanket wrapped around me, am cocooned in it's warm, and yet I still shiver with an unnatural cold. I want to get dressed, want something more substantial than the thin shirt that the pirate has given me.

But my dress is destroyed, torn apart by his dagger, by his cruelty. He's made no offer to fetch one of the many spare gowns that I have, made no acknowledgement that I come to him with whole chests full of clothing, jewels and gold. I wonder why, wonder what he intends to do with all that wealth my dowry will bring him. Those riches are wasted on him, that money once destined for a greater use. I think of the people it could have helped, the future it could have secured. By my marriage, or not, that money was not meant for the likes of a filthy, revenge minded pirate.

There's a knock at the door, a loud rap of sudden sound. It has such a forceful tone to it that I can't help but be curious as to what the emergency could be. Dare I hope my father has not only learned of Killian's misdeeds, but sent ships after him? Dare I get my hopes up of a rescue? It's doubtful, the unconcerned, unrushed manner of the pirate killing the chance of that long before he opens the door. Two men are there, both clearly pirates, the old one named Smee and a much younger lad who casts a curious glance my way. I am mortified, pulling tighter the blanket around me. The only part of me that shows is my head, and yet even that much leaves me feeling too exposed.

I'm content when they ignore me, when the three pirates hold a hushed conversation. Killian listens quietly for the most part, nodding his head at occasional intervals. The few times that he speaks, he comes off as calm, not a single betraying tension to him. I feel the disappointment take root, feel all my hopes and dreams of my father's imagined attempt at a rescue dashed. There's nothing real happening, no problem or trouble, Killian and his crew cleanly getting away with their latest crime.

Sullen now, I sit and stare at his profile, study the relaxed expression on his face. The other two pirates are dismissed, the younger one sneaking one last look at me, before the door closes in his face. I didn't like it, I didn't like him, having recognized the look in his eyes, that open hunger that didn't hold a candle to the desirous passion that consumed his captain. Seeing that look in another's gaze, reminded me of why I had sacrificed so much, of why I had bartered not just my body but my obedience. For the women in the hold, for their virtues and their peace of mind, so that they never need fear what such a look their way meant.

I thought myself satisfied with that much, but it is tainted by the memory of the things that Killian does to me. The awareness I now have, the mortification that lets the tiniest spark of anger come to life inside me. It must show in my eyes, the pirate acknowledging it's existence, with one spoken word, a question that I could give so many answers to.

"Problem?"

I stared back at him, my tongue silent as I thought it over. Do I give him the satisfaction of my upset? Do I let him know just how badly he has hurt me? Or do I keep my pain private, hold back that much from him?

"You tell me." Is what I end up saying. His eyebrows rose at that, had I succeeded in confusing him? Or was Killian merely bracing himself for the tirade he sensed brimmed inside me? It tried to boil over, tried to make me snap. And I might have, if he wasn't so unpredictable, if I wasn't so scared of how he would punish me. It wasn't that I thought the pirate would beat me, it was the sexual threat of him that stayed the worst of my tongue.

"That knock on the door seemed awfully urgent." I finally add. "What was so important…?"

"That?" He asks with a chuckle. "That wasn't so much important, as Smee being his usually bossy self."

"Bossy?" Now my brow is the one to lift, the confusion and curiosity that I feel, making me say, "I thought being bossy was YOUR job. You ARE the captain of this ship, are you not?"

"Captain I may be, but it would take a miracle to get old Smee to stop trying to micro manage my day." I only looked more confused, wondering what there was to micro manage of a pirate's life. They were free, lawless creatures who prowled the land and the sea, taking what they wanted when they wanted, consequences be damned. It was the kind of careless life that I thought didn't leave room for planning much out, life lived from day to day, their carefree ways unburdened by the rigid rules and propriety of the rest of society.

That imagined way of life was all so different from mine, from what I had known at the convent. As princess I had LESS free time, not more, my strict rigid schedule of studies, charity, and devotion meant to prepare me for the role of coruling a kingdom. The few bits of time that I actually took for myself were a luxury, Mother Superior zealously drilling into my head that my duty came first over any privilege.

"Smee means well." continued Killian. "Moreover, I can TRUST him." I couldn't stop the sound from escaping me, that scoff putting emphasis on how little I thought of trust where a pirate was concerned. Killian's lips twitched with his suppressed amusement. "On the sea, trust is even more valuable than on land. Especially for a pirate."

"Well…..yes….I suppose even YOUR kind would want a break from all the thieving, murdering, and back stabbing!" My manner was haughty, my tone waspish.

"It's no different than what goes on at a certain King's court." Killian countered in a mild tone. I gasp at his daring, at the look that flashed in his eyes. Some dark, unfathomable thought that wiped away all traces of his earlier amusement.

"First you malign my father, and now you dare besmirch the honorable men and women of his court?!" I ask.

"Honorable?" He quirked a brow at me. "You've been away from your kingdom for TOO long if you think that."

I can't argue that. Sequestered at the convent as I had been since the age of eight, it's been years since I set foot beyond the island's village. The bustling cities of Avonlea, the rustic villages that farmed the land on the kingdom's outskirts, I knew none of it, my hazy memories of a child centered solely on my mother and vague memories of life at the castle.

It still didn't mean I could so easily believe him, in the idea that the people of my father's court were corrupt. "I know it is inevitable, that corruption seeks into the heart of even the best of men. But not all give into it!"

"Some don't." He agreed to my surprise. "But how much harder is it to resist, when led by a King who gave in to the dark impulses of his own black heart." He stepped towards the bed, prowled his way closer to me. "Tell me princess..how long do you think a good man would last, at so corrupt a court? How long before he too became just as twisted?"

"I don't know..." I whispered, instantly set on alert at his approach. He was holding my gaze with his, making it look so graceful as he crawled up onto the bed. I fought to not start shaking, trying to remember the mask I had once worn, that brave and spirited soul who had refused to cower and cry before him. It lay broken in pieces, the proud defiant princess that I once was, damaged by this very pirate's hand.

"How long do you think it took ME?" He then asked, Killian laying a hand on the blanket. Threatened by him, by his nearness, it took me longer to grasp an understanding of the words he had spoken, the idle question that he had asked.

"Yours was a special circumstance!" I quickly speak. "If Liam hadn't..."

"Liam was just the start of my fall." Killian interrupted me. "It took your father's TORTURE to make me into this man."

"I'm sorry." It's a heartfelt whisper, the sorrow that is inside me balled around the memory of the boy the pirate had once been.

"Hmmm?" He cocked his head to the side. "It will take a whole lot more than sorry…."

"What then?" I ask him "What will it take to leave you satisfied? How many more lives will you ruin, how much more blood must be shed before you feel your revenge has been reached!?" My fingers curled on the blanket, held fast by my hands, my arms trembling with intent. "Do you even KNOW?!" 

With each blink of his eyes, the blue only got darker. He was shifting into that angry rage, that level of fury that the pirate achieved whenever he thought too deeply about the past. "I am OWED this."

"And what of what is owed by you?!" I retorted. "What will YOU do to make amends for your many misdeeds?!" 

"The blood I spilled is as much Maurice's fault as it is my own!" He argued. "It's because of him that I..."

"Do you really believe that?!" I interrupt him to ask. The way he looked at me in turn, the bright angry gaze, the unrelenting stubbornness, it tore a faint o of sound from me, my body abruptly sagging in defeat. It took a special kind of madness to so completely put the blame on another, to believe that your every wrong doing was justified, made that way because you thought you were owed. Most people knew better than that, most knew that regardless of whatever personal tragedy you may have been through, it didn't give you the right to in turn inflict pain and suffering on others.

There was no real reasoning with a person who thought otherwise. I KNEW that, and yet the part of me that still clung to the memory of the child Killian had once been, kept urging me to try. That memory fluttering to weak life in my heart, refused to give up, refused to be buried so completely. And maybe that left me half as deluded as him, this memory I cling to, this fantasy it tried to build upon, making me want to believe there was a chance of reaching through to him. Of getting him to see, of making him accept his personal responsibility and stop Killian from striving for a revenge that kept him from achieving any real happiness or peace of mind.

"Killian…." I say, the blanket slipping somewhat, as I raise my hand to him. "You must...must move past your hate."

He had been still for my touch, but at the words, Killian's eyes flared to life with all of his malevolent rage. "You've no right to tell me that!"

"No right?! NO right?!" I repeat in a steel state of disbelief. It's either that or get angry, and that red emotion brims just under the surface of my skin. "After all I have let you do to me?!"

"Oh you LET me?" He challenges with a cruel sneer. He grabs at my wrist, grips painful hold of me as he speaks. "Let me make it abundantly clear, princess. You didn't let me do anything that I couldn't just TAKE."

It's cruel and it's hurtful, and yet it is the absolute truth. There was nothing I could truly do to keep him from me, nothing to stop him from abusing me in that way or any other. I was deluding myself if I thought otherwise, the best that I could hope for was the illusion of control that he had allowed me, that mercy he had shown the women in the hold in exchange for my obedience.

His own gaze brims with the cold satisfaction over what he is saying, Killian not having to touch me to prove his point. He doesn't have to do anything, the pained acknowledgement warping my very expression.

"Wh….what do you ultimately intend to do with me?" It's not the first time I've wondered that, the long sleepless night giving me endless amount of time to worry and fret and come up with God awful scenarios. I didn't know what to hope for, what would be worse Killian killing me, or for this abuse to continue. My heart couldn't take the suspense any longer, my voice crying out for him to just answer me.

"It doesn't really matter WHAT I do with you now." He hardly alleviates my upset, wearing that darkly cruel look. "So long as that alliance doesn't happen."

"The war…." I breathed out. "What will you do after that war devastates our homeland?"

He shrugs his shoulders. "Besides revel in Maurice's downfall and misery? Well I suppose I can think of a few things."There's a dark heat in his eyes, Killian lifting his hand to my face, to stroke my bottom lip with his thumb. I push at him, try and fail to put any distance between us.

"You can't mean to keep me!" I protest with a wild sound. But that look in his eyes makes me wonder just how serious a consideration he might have actually given to such an idea.

"And why not?" He asks, his warm breath on my face. His wicked mouth is so close to mine, lips stopping just short of touching, as every word caresses the air between us.

"I...because I am a princess!" I blurt out. "I have duties...obligations..."

"The world thinks you're dead." He reminds me. "And even if for some reason they found out otherwise, do you really think anyone would care about a woman despoiled by a pirate?"

"Cruel." I bit out, the tears stinging my eyes. "You're far too cruel!"

"The truth usually is." I push at him again, try to stop the kiss from happening. Killian just laughs, a soft chuckle of sound breathed against my lips, a second before he slants his over mine. The firm feel of them, the harsh unrelenting passion that they convey, can't distract me from my upset. Or from the cruel truths that the pirate won't let me hide from any longer.

To Be Continued…

Next chapter is another Killian POV! Despite what it may look like, my plans insist they don't have sex in the next chapter. I am trying my best to keep it from getting derailed again on that front at least. I'm a bit frustrated, cause I couldn't get the chapter to match up to how I envisioned it in on my notes, Damn dialogue was tripping me up, the conversations….well let's just say a lot of time it is easier to write smut than anything else! But I always feel the dialogues are among what I struggle the most with. Actually I think when it comes time for the characters to talk, that's my weakest link. X_X

Can't really think of anything to ramble on about this time. Sorry for such a short chapter. I just wanted it over with at this point. I already have Killian's voice rattling around in my head, so I don't think I will be coming back to add anything to ten. Since my vocal muse is making it known he had plenty to say! XD

Laters!

-Michelle

Flowersandmagicspells, I like that name by the way! And thank you sooooooooooo much! That was a really nice and encouraging feedback to receive, especially after I felt so nervous over that scene in nine. It really made my day when I woke up and read your words. So thank you. :)


	11. Chapter Eleven

She brings to life such ideas in my head, all sort of delicious imaginings that I am all too quick to seize upon and make real. And with each thorough tasting, my cravings, the hunger that the princess stirs inside me, only grows stronger, wilder, that mad maelstrom of desire an unstoppable, unquenchable force. What is it about this woman, this princess, that spurs my lust so? That make me think and do things that go beyond my comprehension of what is right and what is wrong? Is it the combination of her sweet sensuality and her looks? That wide eyed innocence that is nothing at all like the poison influence that is her father's own brand of sinister evil?

It's simply something that I can't answer, the only certainty in my heart that of the temptation to take my sweetly despoiled little virgin for a third time in less than twenty four hours. I know it would be beyond cruel, and yet I almost can't stop myself. Almost don't WANT to, the sweet trembling of her lip's kiss, flaring the need to life inside me, my hands already moving to push her down. She fights me every inch of the way, those delicate hands of hers curling into fists that she then beats lightly at my chest with. It's not any real attempt to dissuade me, Belle simply too frightened of me to make a true show of refusal. It's there in the way that she trembles, in the way that she flinches back, and tries to knock sense into me with such a gentle touch. I'm conflicted by that fear, one twisted half aroused by it, while another, softer, kinder part of me feels a sad kind of sorrow at what I've become, a sexual deviant that takes pleasure in forcing himself on a woman.

I suppose I should be angry, though as to who I should ultimately direct this sort of feeling towards, I am not entirely sure. At Belle for luring me into this brand of misconduct, or at her father for being the ruin of everything that I've ever held dear, or even at myself for letting go of the final vestige of my remaining honor last night? The one thing that is clear? That it's a new brand of monster that I've become, some insatiable fiend who won't ever be satisfied with just one night. Her words linger, not so much in my ears, as in my heart, Belle's voice aghast as she had protested that I couldn't mean to KEEP her.

I realize then, that yes, yes I do. And it's a million kinds of wrong, the rasping harshness of my breath suddenly filling the room, as I tear free of the kiss and of her. Her wide eyed surprise, those trembling lips, the way that she looks splayed across my bed wearing nothing but my shirt, it all makes me actively war against myself, my shaking right hand scrubbing across my face in a betraying sign of my agitation.

Neither of us say a word. Belle's simply too frightened or stunned, and I? I simply don't trust myself in the moment. If I'm at all honest, I haven't for a while now, for the wildness that I feel, that and the desire that was birthed that first instant that I had looked into her eyes, making all my carefully laid plans spiral out of control. I've been crazed because of it, angry because of it, and I've hurt her because of it. I can't justify it, and I certainly can't make amends for it, or the many other things that I have done and intend to still do. Belle's only a small part of my vengeance, and there's still so much to be done before I can finally live up to my promise to Liam. That promise and the debt that I owe him, are not something that will be easily appeased by one virgin's blood. There's a whole kingdom's worth of pain to inflict, a hundred and one ways to continue dismantling Maurice's greedy grasp at a legacy of domination and tyranny. Death is too good for an evil like that King, Maurice a man that not only needs to suffer, but most assuredly has earned it.

Each day and with every strike against him, I come closer to his complete ruin. I won't be satisfied until the kingdom turns against him, until his own people drive him out of Avonlea with their knives and flaming pitchforks. It won't just end with Maurice stripped of his crown and his kingdom, I want him hated, hunted, harassed for the rest of his miserable life. I want him to never again know a minute's rest, to never again have any allies, power, or the money to secure the illusion of safety. I want him to cower, to be afraid, and I want him to at last know the real reason behind all his misfortunes. I want to look right into his eyes, to be there when Maurice finally realizes that not all dead stay buried.

The vengeance that cries out an insistent beat inside of me, has never once given consideration to what I will do AFTER. It's never even come close to letting me try to picture what life will be like once revenge is mine, once the King is utterly ruined and stripped free of all he has ever known. It still doesn't, and perhaps that is a grim foreshadow of the emptiness that I will ultimately face once my sole purpose in life has been achieved.

With no real purpose and no real reason left to me, is that the reason why I react so strongly to the idea of keeping the princess? Do I look to her for a lifeline, someone to cling to once Maurice has been brought to justice by his people? Or do I think her the balm that will soothe the savage that is inside me, the filthy pirate that I now am? I nearly laugh out loud at that, sick with the irony that my every touch forced on her strips me of any right of just that.

She maintains her watchful stare the entire time I debate myself. Those beautiful blue eyes gleam with a wet sheen, one lone tear slipping down across one perfect cheek. Belle bites at her bottom lip as she looks at me, still so scared to otherwise move. It's a wise council that the princess takes from her fear, for even I, myself, can't predict just how I'll react. That she makes me want things is a fact, the princess a weakness I am ill equip to prepare for. I do the only wise thing that I can, retreating from her and the bed, while I make light of my mood.

"Keep laying there so inviting, and I'll forget that I've duties that Smee insists I attend to." She seems to pale in understanding, visibly trembling in place atop the bed and it's blankets. I smirk at her while inwardly fighting a groan, quick to turn my back on her as I go to put on the rest of my clothing. My shirt covers the many wounds that I now have, both from the crew's fighting last night, and from the princess' own nails. Both are badge of honors in their own twisted ways, and both are ones I might normally flaunt if the tension aboard the ship wasn't already so high.

"Rest up." I advised her, buckling my sword belt into place around me. Over it goes my long leather coat, the garment falling into place in such a way that the silver handle of my sword lays out in the open revealed for an easy drawing. I make sure of it just to be safe, practicing drawing my weapon several times from different positions before I am satisfied.

Less satisfying is her silence, as though the princess's voice had been stolen along with her lips. My irritation shows in the sidelong glance that I give her, some perverse part of me wanting to needle her into a reaction. "You'd best keep your strength up princess, for the long nights are ahead of you."

I don't get her voice, though I do get the sight of her narrowing a glare at me. For all that I've done to Belle, for all the hurt that I've inflicted, there's still some spark of open defiance within her. For this morning, this moment, I am happy to see it. In fact, the angrier she grows, the wider my smile becomes, my arm sweeping out in an exaggerated gesture, as I give a mocking bow to her.

She waits until I shut the door behind me, before I hear the thump of something soft hitting the wall. I grin harder in response, wondering what sort of reception I will face once the princess has had time to stew in her anger some.

"You're looking happy this morning." A quiet voice says from the shadows to the side of me. Immediate is my reaction, the sword drawn as I put the door to my back. The shadows shift, an ebony skin colored man stepping out into the light.

"Sevastian." I breathe out a name, but don't quite relax my guard. The ebony colored pirate looks at me with approval, and it's not just his dark brown eyes that are taking in my every detail.

"I didn't believe it." Sevastian offers to me, holding up both his hands in surrender. He's not made harmless for an instant, those thick, muscular arms of his quite capable of beating, bashing, even breaking a man in half. "When Smee made mention of the fact you actually seemed to be HAPPY this morning….."

"Smee talks too much for his own good." I grumble, and carefully shift so I can keep one wary eye on Sevastian while I attempt to lock my bedroom door.

"That he does, but it doesn't change the fact that what he said is true."

"Is it?" I challenge, satisfied when I heard the click of the locked door. I then quickly put the key into the cavernous depths of one pocket.

"I saw you." Sevastian solemnly points out. "With a grin that spread from ear to ear, a sight I haven't seen in many a year. Not since…."

"Not since Liam died." I finish for him. We both go silent at that, giving up honor to Liam by taking a quiet moment to think fondly of him.

"He was a good captain." Sevastian finally says. "A good brother…."

"A good MAN." I point out in retort. "He was taken too soon from this world..."

"That he was." Sevastian agrees, and the rest of my guarded tension leaves me. Brother in arms for far longer than we had been pirates, there was very little true chance of Sevastian meaning any lasting harm towards me.

"What is the mood of what is left of our crew?"

"Besides angry, surly and horny?" Sevastian counters with a question. "As ugly as it's ever been, especially with Smee letting slip the news of your good mood."

I grumbled something under my breath about punishing Smee for his overly talkative ways. Sevastian grinned in a good natured manner, laughing it off as just talk. He knew as well as I did, that the debt I owed Smee and Sevastian both, would keep me from truly hurting either one of them. The same couldn't be said for most of the rest of my crew, many of the men who now sailed with me pirates who had never been loyal to any king or kingdom. Those who had, had all been members of the original crew of the Jewel of the Ream, those few men having borne bold witness to the evils King Maurice was capable of.

Indeed they hadn't just borne witness to it, they had lived through it, surviving many a horror done to themselves, to their friends, even to their families. Innocents had been killed, countless made into sacrifice as both punishment and as cover for one man's twisted ambitions. Liam and the many others lost, weigh heavily on us all, a blood debt owed, that could only be paid in kind.

Stained as our hands were by all that blood, we were dirty in a way that was different from Maurice. That King's evil stemmed from a greedy desire for more of everything, riches, power, land. While ours? Ours was borne from the need for justice. That honorable need would never truly excuse us, the many innocents like the princess caught in the crossfire of this vendetta, hurt by it, suffering because of it, even laying dead as a result of it.

More would be sacrificed. The entire ocean's already cramped bottom, would be littered with the many unsalvageable wrecks of the ships that I and my crew continued to sink. And with each ship destroyed, so went more of Avonlea's hopes, Maurice growing more desperate by the hour as every form of aide fell short of reaching him. That kingdom was doomed, it's king cursed, and soon there wouldn't be anyone left to extend a hand or their support to Maurice and Avonlea.

My lips curled with the thought, a malevolent smirk that held no true pleasure to my expression. It was fact that the ruin of Avonlea was a necessary evil. The people of that kingdom needed to know true fear and suffering, needed a helping hand to push them to overthrow Maurice from his throne. The kingdom itself probably wouldn't survive, Avonlea broken up into smaller territories, as it's neighbors fought to take control of every bit of land. What was already one vulture, would become many, custom and culture lost to greed and fighting. The princess wouldn't even have a home to return to when all was said and done, no one of Avonlea would.

It couldn't be helped. Maurice needed to be stopped. Not just stopped, he need to be made accountable for all he had done, all the evil he had yet to pay for.

"And why shouldn't I be in a good mood?" I wonder out loud to Sevastian. "We've stolen another victory out from under ole' Maurice's nose. Let's see him make that alliance now without his only bargaining chip!"

"Some would say that very bargaining chip is WHY you are in such a good mood." Sevastian countered with a grin. "Is the princess as sweet a treat as she looks?"

"Even sweeter." I retort, and something about my expression must soften. Sevastian stops, and gives me his total regard, those chocolate colored eyes piercing me as though they could read into my thoughts, my heart, my very soul.

"This is more than a good mood."

"What do you mean?" I ask, and feel unsettled by the words that the pirate then gives me.

"You really ARE happy."

"Happy…?" I shake my head in denial, happiness and any form of it's joy, feelings long since killed off inside me. What had started with Liam's death, had snuffed out fully in that shallow grave, leaving behind only slivers of a perverse pleasure that nurtured to life each time I thought of Maurice's ultimate suffering and comeuppance.

"You misunderstand." I continue. "This is not happiness. This is…..satisfaction."

"Satisfaction eh?" Sevastian snorted at that. "It damn well comes off as happy to me." His eyes dance with his laughter, Sevastian grinning. "There's no need to feel ashamed of it." He adds. "There's nothing wrong in enjoying a beautiful woman, in letting her lift up your spirits."

"My spirits weren't the thing that was lifted." I snap but Sevastian only outright laughs in response.

"Killian." He says once the laughter has died. With a somber look, he clasps a hand carefully onto my shoulder. "Your brother Liam wouldn't want you to be miserable. He wouldn't want you to not live your life to it's fullest potential."

"Liam is dead." I coldly retort, shrugging off that friendly hand.

"That doesn't mean you have to be too." Sevastian counters. "I didn't dig you up out of that grave only to watch you squander away your second chance at life!"

"I thought you craved vengeance almost as much as I do. Has that changed?" I demand.

"No, of course it hasn't." He quickly affirms. "But I don't see how the best revenge can't in part be by living life to it's fullest."

"And just how will that lead to Maurice's ruin? How will living my life and being happy see justice served on him. It's not just Liam as you well know, there's so many lost that demand the debt be repaid in kind. Your daughter, your wife…." 

Those dark eyes sobered with his sorrow. "You needn't remind me." The breath exhaled out of him in a weighty sigh. "I'll never forget, and I'll never forgive." I start to nod in response, but Sevastian is not done by a long shot. "But I also won't dishonor them, by becoming a miserable shell of my former self. Martinia wouldn't want that. And Liam wouldn't either!"

"This is my decision to make." It's more than a tad stubborn, but even as I acknowledge it as fact, I am digging my heels.

"Oh aye." Sevastian lets out a long suffering sound. "That it is. But it won't stop me from hoping you go against it, and learn to live happy."

"My vengeance..."

"Will leave you empty once it's over and done." Sevastian insists. "If you don't find something to fill it's void..."

"Fill it? With what? With Who? The princess?" I snort. "Don't be absurd."

"Why is it absurd?" He asks. "She's already rekindled to life a lone spark inside you."

"She's also HIS daughter for one thing. The man I am intent on ruining."

"So? Anyone good who learns of the depth of Maurice depravity, will surely turn against him. Even his own flesh and blood…."

"You're assuming she'd want to believe..." I counter. "And that I'd tell her."

"Why wouldn't you? Why haven't you already?" He demands. "Killian….."

"It won't do any good." I say. "It won't change the fact that I am destroying her home land, driving it's people into a war they won't be able to win. She won't be able to look past that, won't be able to forgive me no matter how awful and evil her father and his court of accomplices truly are!"

He opened and closed his mouth on a wordless sound of frustration, but Sevastian couldn't refute what I was saying. If the princess was as good and pure hearted as I believed her to be, then there was no way she could forgive me. No way she could look past the things I have done, the many crimes I commit, the sins I continue to accumulate.

"There's no chance for a future there.." I mutter it, and continue down the hall's path. "No chance of a happily ever after for us. There NEVER was."

To Be Continued…

I don't really like this chapter, and I think it shows how much I struggled with it. Sorry to go so long between updates. The night I finished the last chapter, ten, I barely finished it, before I got a phone call that added a lot of stress and craziness to my life. Seriously. I was having bad anxiety for about two weeks, complete with panic attacks...was in no condition to write, and once that stress calmed down and started to go away, I found it really hard to get back into writing. I'm still finding it hard to. I'm not sure if I am gonna tinker with this chapter some more….right now I think it's finished. I am hating on it SO much. I feel like this is the best I am capable of, and I hate that it sucks….

I may go update something else. Been thinking about some of my other Hook Belle fics that I need to update. (Like Broken Hearted Comfort!) It just makes it hard to continue when I hate on a chapter as much as I am hating on this one. The weird thing is, when I come back after a while, I probably won't remember WHY I hated on this chapter so much….

As for the fic, so...been dropping the hints for a while now. Has anyone caught on to the fact Killian was literally buried alive? That's why he keeps talking about he died. My head cannon for this fic is Maurice tortured Killian for Neverland, and when Killian wouldn't break and tell him what he wanted to know, Maurice had him buried alive...but luckily Sevastian and Smee came to Killian's rescue and dug him up in time…

I'm also frustrated, cause I thought I would have this chapter be advanced to a different kind of ending. But really I got to the point I just wanted this chapter over with. But originally I had wanted Killian to go to the deck, do some stuff that would time advance the story, to him returning to the cabin. Guess I will try to aim it to happen for the NEXT chapter.

Sorry to be such a downer in the author's note section. I feel like my mood got defeated by this chapter! ^^;; In other news, my left hand, the fingers are having a neuropathy reaction. It's so weird...it comes and goes. It lasts for a few weeks, or few months at a time, but it's so surreal to try and type this with numb fingers on one hand. Luckily it's not all five fingers. Only two. But it's still very weird, and I hope it goes away soon. I always fear the day this numbness in my fingers will be permanent like it is in my toes…

-Michelle

Guest, Thanks. :) I'm pretty fond of Dark Hook too. Dark, tortured feels Hook is so delish! As for Belle, well it is rape so far, so she is right to be upset. Even if she bodily ends up feeling pleasure, she is still hurt by his actions. We'll see how it eventually shapes up. _

Jennie, hi! Nice to meet you, and thank you for such a wonderful review! Ah Voltron….someday I hope to get back to it, but who knows when that will be. I have a lot of note files for my various stories, not just Voltron, but for Once and VP. And my note files tend to get HUGE. I think my brain is too ambitious to be honest with a lot of these ideas. They're all meant to be so long….

At least this time I have my note files backed up a million times in several discs and flashdrives. Back in like 2009, I had a bad computer crash and not only lost my note files for a few of my fics (So I am clueless on what I intended to do with those) but I lost five work in progress chapters, and a completed VP chapter that I had been just about ready to post. I am still kinda upset when I think about the chapters I lost. Really kicking myself for not posting it asap! 

Anyway! I'm so glad you decided to give this fic a try, even if it's not your fandom/show. What's more, I tickled pink that you seemed to enjoy it so much! Yay! And also much appreciated is the well wishes, and the lack of pressure. Pressure just kinda has the opposite effect on me, where it stresses me out, and makes me not want to write... _

Guest, thank you! :)


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